Draw a picture of a gun and see what is "construed".
Posted on 05/28/2005 7:24:30 PM PDT by Coleus
A school resource officer arrested an 11-year-old Rawlinson Road Middle School student Wednesday after the boy went to school with 10 nails in his pocket. The boy produced the three-and-a-half-inch-long nails after Dianne McCray, the school's assistant principal, asked about a jingling sound in his right pocket. McCray asked to see what was in his pocket, and he gave her the nails.
The boy first said the nails were from a project about 10 days before, according to the police report. He then said the nails were for self-defense because a suspicious man had been seen in his neighborhood. He also said he needed the nails for a Boy Scout outing this weekend, the report said.
He was charged with having an unlawful weapon but was not taken to the police station; his father picked him up from school. The Herald is not identifying the boy because of his age.
The boy had the nails from an earlier scouting trip, his father said, and noticed them in his pocket after putting on a pair of pants he had not worn since the trip.
"They were not to be used as a weapon at school," the boy's father said.
McCray then called in school resource officer Ashley Doster, who sought charges against the boy.
State law says anything that can be construed or used as a weapon on school grounds can be classified as unlawful, said Lt. Jerry Waldrop of the Rock Hill Police Department.
"I'm not second-guessing the officer that made the charge," Waldrop said. "The nails could have been used against other students. The juvenile with them did state he had them for protection against a suspicious male in the neighborhood."
But the boy's father said his son did not threaten anyone with the nails, did not do anything violent, and had no intentions to use the nails as a weapon.
"Is a pencil a weapon? Is a pen a weapon? Is a paperclip a weapon?" the father asked. "I think this whole charge is ridiculous."
The decision to have the boy arrested was made by the school's administrators, said Rock Hill school district spokeswoman Elaine Baker, who did not know specifically why the decision was made.
"The information I read was that the student didn't bring the nails to harm anybody," Baker said. "They were left in there (the pocket) from something else."
McCray did not return several phone calls from The Herald.
Resource Officer
Ashley Doster
Email
Mrs. Dianne Hart-McCray
6th Grade Assistant Principal
Email
I don't e mail hyphenated teachers.
filing civil suits is the only way to curb these nonsense arrests.
A lot of kids take Tae Kwon Do lessons nowadays. Are they themselves weapons, and should they be banned??
Insane. Does the Middle School have a wood shop? If they do, shut it down, no telling what type of nails they have in there /sarcasm
When they outlaw vinyl sinkers only outlaws will ...
Draw a picture of a gun and see what is "construed".
Getting out my trusty crystal ball: I see a lawsuit for wrongful arrest. I see the plaintiff winning.
It's in the water FUR SHUR.
Got to break their spirit at the first hint of individuality.
Hey! Teacher! Leave those kids alone!
How do they teach Geometry without the use of a compass?
PRINCIPAL: "And is there anyone against whom you might have needed to use these nails as weapons?"
KID: Well, there was this scary kinda guy hanging around our neighborhood..."
Bottom line: Until his questioners suggested -- and coached him into -- it, the kid had not even thought of the nails as potential weapons.
ENTRAPMENT!!
I wonder if it's possible to strangle someone with a super-strength condom. That would certainly put the school in a dilemma!
I'm sure it's here somewhere, but in what state is this school located?
I wonder if there are any dastardly fingernail files laying around teachers' desks at Rawlinson Road Middle School.
South Carolina
Boy, 11, arrested for having nails at school
Why add the word "Scout"?
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