Boy charged with felony for carrying sugar

suntimes ^ | February 11, 2006

[Revel]

Boy charged with felony for carrying sugar

BY JUSTINA WANG A 12-year-old Aurora boy who said he brought powdered sugar to school for a science project this week has been charged with a felony for possessing a look-alike drug, Aurora police have confirmed.

The sixth-grade student at Waldo Middle School was also suspended for two weeks from school after showing the bag of powdered sugar to his friends.

The boy, who is not being identified because he is a juvenile, said he brought the bag to school to ask his science teacher if he could run an experiment using sugar.

Two other boys asked if the bag contained cocaine after he showed it to them in the bathroom Wednesday morning, the boy's mother said.

He joked that it was cocaine, before telling them, "just kidding," she said.

Aurora police arrested the boy after a custodian at the school reported the boy's comments. The youngster was taken to the police station and detained, before being released to his parents that afternoon.

"This is getting ridiculous," said the boy's mother. "They treated my son like a criminal. .. . This is no way to treat a 12-year-old kid."

East Aurora School District officials declined to comment on the case, citing privacy issues.

The district issued a written statement, which said: "The dangers of illegal drugs and controlled substances are clear.

Could get probation "Look-alike drugs and substances can cause that same level of danger because staff and students are not equipped to differentiate between the two."

The school handbook states that students can be suspended or expelled for carrying a look-alike drug.

Penalties for juveniles are decided on a case-by-case basis, but if convicted, the sixth-grader could likely face up to five years' probation, said Jeffery Jefko, deputy director of Kane County juvenile court services.

Juveniles who have prior criminal records could also be placed in a residential treatment program if convicted, he said.

Aurora Beacon-News

[Paul C. Jesup]

So you claim that legalizing drugs will "free the children"?

Well last I looked most children are not junkies on smoking and beer.

You seem to be willing destroy freedom in that name of 'saving the children', most of the problems we have in this country are from people who used that excuse as their justifications.

Now answer my question from my previous post to you.

[sweet_diane]

"I'd like to take all these people and condemn them to spend a month with my seventh-graders. I'm not sure describing these kids as stupid is accurate, as some of them are really, really articulate, but they have their heads in a whole different world from the rest of us. Good dose of reality needed here.

I bet your students parents would LOVE to hear that comment. If teaching 7th graders is so horrible, why do you do it? Not that your attitude is any different than what I experienced when mine were in middle school. You see, kids at that age ARE NOT ADULTS. It's a brain chemistry/function thing.

[PLOM...NOT!]

"The school handbook states that students can be suspended or expelled for carrying a look-alike drug."
Oops. Game over. Mom, good luck if you decide to sue.

Except he wasn't carrying a drug, look-alike or not, he was carrying sugar which last I looked was not considered a drug.

[takenoprisoner]

"Alleged teacher" Typical. When someone presents with a personal experience that is different from what is expected the next "logical" step is to attack that person and call them a liar. "

Ok but at the least one of the most naive teachers on the planet.

Actually you came across my radar because you have defended the arrest of a child for possession of sugar. I find this action one of the most vile and sickening behaviors on the planet...America should be ashamed....and anyone supporting defending condoning this lunacy ought to be ashamed...and if I had my way, tarred and feathered as well.

America has gone mad.

[OKIEDOC]

We are (my family)lucky here in San Diego to have a good elementary school.

Each morning the children start out with an assembly where they sing God Bless America and say the Pledge of Allegiance Under God.

I have spent some time observing and am impressed with the teachers.

However, this may be a one of a kind school.

The principal is a no nonsense traditionalist but alas next year she will retire.

I believe that some of the teachers are starting to see that their formerly liberal views just do not turn out smart good citizens.

[Paul C. Jesup]

I believe that some of the teachers are starting to see that their formerly liberal views just do not turn out smart good citizens.

I wonder how many lives they had to ruin to reach that conclusion.

[takenoprisoner]

addendum: I meant as a metaphor only to tar and feather those those legislators for passing such manical legislation and then the school administrators for
enforcing it.

[Thoeting]

The child was referred to the police for possesion of an unknown substance. The police charged him -- not the school.

I neither defend or condemn the acts of the school or police. I do think there is more to the story than is being told. Furthermore, it is amazing that people here completely believe every word out of the mother's mouth without question.

[Thoeting]

I attended Bob Jones University. There was no drug use going on anywhere near me.

[Thoeting]

Is there a legitimate science experiment for powdered sugar? I teach primarily language arts and history, so this is an honest question, not being cynical.

[JudgemAll]

They perfectly know the difference, but this is HGWells' time machine story: the government is only there to feed at us, not to fight the evils for which we hired it for.

The same idiocy goes with global warming and psycholgy. Even if globowarming were truly harmful, the sheer taxing costs to fight the evil woul harm us more than undergoing its effects. Sustainable development is the same horsesheize. It costs us more in our lives than it does good abroad to give US aid to man made disaster areas.

It's government socialist aristocracy at its worst. The worst part is that secularization brings breakdown of communication as we are only allowed to "psych up" kids to work, but we are not allowed to make them think and make them talk straightforwardly in econmic calculated risks terms.

This kid's sin is that he were smart and told the authorities how innane, stupid and evil they were for trying to psych people up into believing what he did was harmful.

Don't you dare to oppose the secular psychological system mantra, they'll call you paranoiac or phobic, so that they can protect their own paranoiac lives of far greater harm (like all pot smokers, psychs are afraid to be found exploiting people with their intimations and accuzations instead of talking straight to them).

[freepatriot32]

So you claim that legalizing drugs will "free the children"?

I claim that.It wil free children from the threat of getting blown away by drug cops who "accidently" murder them without ever facing charges for thier murders and you and every drug warrior on freerepublic and in society at large are responcible for putting the bullets in these childrens bodys every bit as much as the cops that did the shootings are.

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2001/apr2001/peru-a24.shtml

Missionary plane shot down in Peru: collateral damage in US "drug war"

Following the revelation that a reconnaissance aircraft carrying CIA contract employees participated in the April 20 shoot-down of a plane carrying an American missionary family over the Peruvian Amazon region, Washington has attempted to pin the blame on the Peruvian military.

Whatever the exchange between the CIA contractors and the Peruvian Air Force officer aboard the spy plane, a Peruvian jet fighter was called in and shot into the plane, killing the woman and her baby. It then continued strafing the survivors—the wounded pilot, Ms. Bowers' husband James and their six-year-old son—as they clung to the plane's burning wreckage after it crashed into the Amazon River.

DEA Kills 14-Year-Old Girl in San Antonio, Claims Self Defense

Fourteen-year-old Ashley Villarreal of San Antonio died on February 11 after being shot in the head three days earlier by a DEA agent while driving away from her home.

Ashley Villarreal was the unintended victim of a DEA stake-out designed to catch her father, Joey Villarreal, whom the DEA suspected of involvement in cocaine sales.

The man in the vehicle, David Robles, was not the DEA's suspect.

According to Trevino, Ashley Villarreal continued to drive toward the approaching agents, at which point two DEA agents fired two shots each into the car, striking the girl in the back of the head. Trevino did not explain how a boxed-in car could continue to drive or how it became a threat to the narcs.

There are other questions and doubts about the police version of events. "The agents made it very clear to the people in the car that they were police, that they were agents," Trevino said. But David Robles told the Express News that as Ashley drove him away from the house, it appeared that they were being pursued by unknown assailants. Neither, said Robles, did the assailants identify themselves as law enforcement officers until after they shot into the trapped vehicle, fatally wounding the girl.

Robles' account was supported by "earwitnesses" who heard a crash and then shots. Manuel Martinez, who lives across the street from the shooting site, told the Express News he heard a crash followed by gunfire. "I heard them call to 'Stop! Don't move,'" he said. "I didn't hear them say they were policemen." Other witnesses cited by the Express News supported that account, raising the obvious question about what threat Ashley posed to the agents after her vehicle had already been stopped and boxed in.

DEA agent Bill Swierc has been named as the man who fired the fatal shots, and both the DEA and the San Antonio Police Department are investigating the killing. But as readers of this newsletter know, police shooters in drug cases are rarely bound over for prosecution.

http://www.stopthedrugwar.org/chronicle/169/modesto.shtml

Last October, DRCNet reported on the shooting death of elementary school student Alberto Sepulveda during a raid by the Modesto, California, SWAT team as it executed a federal search warrant in a methamphetamine trafficking investigation Now, after three separate investigations by Modesto police and the city attorney, Modesto police can say only that it was an accident.

Hawn, a veteran member of the Modesto SWAT team, shot and killed young Sepulveda as the boy, following Hawn's barked commands, lay prone on his bedroom floor. At a January 10th press conference called to announce the result of the department's investigations, Police Chief Roy Wasden said Hawn's Benelli shotgun could have misfired, Hawn could have accidentally squeezed the trigger, or Hawn's equipment, particularly a knife on his belt, could have accidentally caused the gun to discharge.

Wasden, however, pointed the finger at the federal law enforcement agencies -- DEA, FBI, and IRS -- at whose behest the Modesto SWAT team executed the warrant.

Across South America, children are being killed by drug war cops.

On April 17, 2003, four unarmed male teens begged for their lives after being caught in a drug sting in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Police shot them all in the back of the head, execution style. At their funerals, unrepentant officers harassed and intimidated the family members of their victims, hoping to scare them from pressing charges.

One night in 1993, 50 homeless children lay huddled together on the steps of a Rio church. According to media reports, five hooded men, arriving in vehicles, fired into their sleeping mass, killing four before they could begin to flee, perhaps before they awoke. A fifth was shot in the back as he ran for cover. Three more were abducted and two of those three were executed later that night. The third was left for dead after being shot in the face. It was later discovered that three of the hooded gunmen were off-duty military police, employed by the US in the war on drugs.

In 2001, police officially killed 52 children in Rio alone. The majority of all police killings in Rio were done with a single shot from behind or to the head. To keep the numbers down, police used secret graves to bury many little bodies

[vikzilla]

12 year old boys I could see them acting like idiots with their friends

The best part of being 12 too. Lighten up America.

[freepatriot32]

I thought you might be interested in this thread if you havent read it already

[Kokojmudd]

The police, prosecutor and school "officials" need to be involuntarily committed to an insane asylum ASAP.

they already are....voluntarily.

[BJungNan]

What is this world coming to... It used to just be bags of Oregano. Now the kids are carrying fake bags of cocaine. Wow.

[1rudeboy]

Is there a legitimate science experiment for powdered sugar? I teach primarily language arts and history, so this is an honest question, not being cynical.

I'm also curious. Morover, is there a legitimate science experiment for powdered sugar that requires a 12-year-old-student to anticipate a powdered sugar shortage at the school? [chuckle]

[Dead Corpse]

Saw it. Shook my head in disgust and walked away. The "Drug War" sinks to a new low. No longer surprising.

[1rudeboy]

How about you? Everyone's been avoiding this question . . . care to give it a try?

I walk up to a United Airlines ticket counter and claim I have a bomb in my bag. I am arrested. Am I innocent because there really is no bomb in my bag?

[Thoeting]

It would be interesting to hear the science teacher's opinion on this. Maybe they were doing a chemistry unit and just the day before the kid asked "What would happen to powdered sugar if......" and she gave him the go-ahead to bring some in. On the other hand, if they are in the middle of a study of outer space and he had never said a word to her about sugar, well, that raises some questions right there.

Again, since the school system is required to be mute, the world may never know.......