View Full Version : Crayon drawings are now felonies!
Original article here (http://www.thedenverchannel.com/family/4130377/detail.html). Text below. This is just...fooking...insane. 9 years old and charged with a felony?
Children Charged With Felonies Over Violent Drawings
POSTED: 7:00 am EST January 26, 2005
OCALA, Fla. -- Two boys, ages 9 and 10, were charged with felonies and taken away from school in handcuffs, accused of making violent drawings of stick figures.
The boys were arrested Monday on charges of making a written threat to kill or harm another person, a second-degree felony. The special education students used pencil and red crayon to draw primitive stick figure scenes on scrap paper that showed a 10-year-old classmate being stabbed and hung, police said.
"The officer found they were drawing these pictures for the sole purpose of intimidating and scaring the victim," said Ocala Police Sgt. Russ Kern.
The boy depicted in the drawings told his teacher, who took the sketches and contacted the school dean, Marty Clifford. Clifford called police, who arrested the boys after consulting with the State Attorney's Office.
They were also suspended from school.
One drawing showed the two boys standing on either side of the other boy and "holding knives pointed through" his body, according to a police report. The figures were identified by written names or initials.
Another drawing showed a stick figure hanging, tears falling from his eyes, with two other stick figures standing below him. Other pieces of scrap paper listed misspelled profanities and the initials of the boy who was allegedly threatened.
Parents of both of the arrested boys said they thought the boys should be punished by the school and families, not the legal system.
Not usre if it should be a felony...
But if some kids were making threats like that, they need to be taken out of that school environment, away from the kdis they are threatening.
Soulstealer
01-26-05, 10:44 AM
The special education students
yeah no way to convict them, if they are in the special education classes they state has already proven they have mental issues.
Drawing violent stick figures, going up to a peer and saying things like "I'm going to kick your ass." Aren't they things most of us did as children? Hell, I can't even begin to count the times I drew the hangman picture of a stick figure hanging off a noose. Is that wrong too? Should we ban Hangman now because OMG! it's 'violent?' Give me a friggin break. Like children really know better. Take them aside, lecture them, tell them that what they're doing is wrong, keep them under close observation, notify the parents, but arresting them and charging them with felonies? C'mon people, don't we have bigger criminals to fry?
Darkefang
01-26-05, 10:50 AM
I would have been in real trouble if I'd have gone to that school then. I remember making a drawing of Mr. T punching a particularly annoying classmate in the face.
That was in my securities economics MBA class last night. I'll bet I drew even worse things when I was 10.
...I hate this country :hmph
Boot Disk
01-26-05, 11:04 AM
I have a bunch of memories from my elementary school days where I'd draw or say something gross, and the teacher would throw out the drawings or take away my recess time... I so wish I could go back in time, smack the teacher, and encourage myself to do even cooler and crazier ****.
AaronEuth
01-26-05, 11:29 AM
Well, we all know kids, or we used to tease and such when we were little. But I don't recall anyone ever implying that they were going to kill another student in my gradeschool. So while I don't agree with how this was handled, I certainly agree that the students should have been removed from that particular school enviroment. I don't think they should have been handcuffed and arrested, just simply sent to counselling and homeschooled or something similiar.
The reaction may have been excessive, but I can't disagree with them for taking this seriously. And special ed does not necessarily mean they have mental problems, they could just as easily have other handicaps. Learning disabilities != mental problems a lot of the time. The fact that the boy who was the victim in the pictures was the one who brought it to the teacher's attention would seem to indicate that the were showing them to him. Which says threatening.
Charging them with felony is too much IMO, they are kids, but I don't think this is the kind of thing you could just overlook. Imagine the fun for the school if they just went "Oh kids will be kids" and then a week later someone gets a hold of their daddy's gun, and whether they shot someone to defend themselves or because hey, it'd be fun to terrorize the snitch who had the nerve not to stand there and take the threats the school would be in a **** load of trouble. The story is also vague enough that there's no way of knowing if these were students the school believed from their past behaviour to be likely to carry out threats made. Maybe it was just a storm in a jar as we say here, maybe it was last in series of bullying. Do you know for sure?
Dragynphyre
01-26-05, 11:33 AM
I suppose the bombs, tanks, guns, and nuclear explosions that all of the boys drew in our grammar school Art class would have gotten them suspsended too - they'd draw a picture of a tank, THEN, they'd take black and red crayons and draw the explosions all over it, while making 'toy noises' of the bombs blowing up "pshooo! BOOM!"
but when they actually put a real life target to that sort of violent thinking - like a classmate - yeah, I can see why the adults became alarmed
Biggwin
01-26-05, 01:31 PM
...I hate this country :hmph
Be careful as they keep chipping away our freedoms, one at a time... soon this might be a felony too!
Hummerlein
01-26-05, 03:52 PM
desea vivo la revolución!
Hey if you hate it here, you can always move somewhere else.
Drawing violent stick figures, going up to a peer and saying things like "I'm going to kick your ass." Aren't they things most of us did as children?
Actually no. I was actually the receiver of that behavior. I'd call them on it and make chicken noises at them when they wouldn't go through with "kicking my ass." Losers.
Dragynphyre
01-27-05, 06:41 AM
Heh, I found that most of the kids were chickens too - when I was challenged to a fight, I'd tell them I'd meet them after school in the park at 3:30pm. I was always there, would wait until 4, and then go home.
None of them ever showed up.
Though if I were to draw the gristly homicidal images that flash through my head on a daily basis (I wonder if I could run that guy over and not get caught?), I'd probably get locked up too. I never act on any of these things... it's more of a stress relieving device for me - get out my aggressions in my imagination instead of going on a killing spree, yanno?
Vilkata Tasavalt
01-27-05, 06:53 AM
That's kind of what worries me...
We all have 'harmless' ways of getting out our inner aggressions and frustrations and such. Be that through drawing pictures, writing, painting, playing video games, playing cops and robbers/cowboys and indians etc...
Seems like a lot of people are trying to take away a lot of those outlets nowadays.
I used to draw demons, devils, violence, blood and all sorts of things. I've never once hurt anyone, nor will I.
-Vilk
Dragynphyre
01-27-05, 07:11 AM
Vilk got me to thinking
What happens when all of the 'harmless' means of dealing with agressions and frustrations through violent games, pictures, stories, etc. are prohibited to us in order to sanitize our lives further?
I'd imagine that more people would SNAP and actually commit those horrid things that used to find expression in other media.
Maybe violence is just inherent in our genetics, and in order to keep civilization going, maybe we need creative outlets such as drawing pictures of stabbing another child, to keep us from actually doing such a thing.
So, these adults, by removing these creative outlets in an attempt to create a safer environment, will actually cause these children to end up acting on their baser instincts.
Hm... I think I'm going to have to take a major in Psychology and/or Sociology when I go back to school in the fall, this stuff is actually fascinating me... that or wind up writing a really macabre novel ;)
The impression I got from this article was that the pictures were specifically designed to intimidate and instill fear in another individual. They were not "doodles" in the corner of a notebook. They were written threats.
I agree, a felony charge is over the top though. I'd tend to agree with the parents and let the school system and the parents eke out punishment. They should, however, be removed from the school.
Heh, I found that most of the kids were chickens too - when I was challenged to a fight, I'd tell them I'd meet them after school in the park at 3:30pm. I was always there, would wait until 4, and then go home.
None of them ever showed up.
Hahaha...the jokes on you. It was all psychological warfare. They knew you would sit there until four while they were at home laughing and eating milk and cookies. = )
Heh, I found that most of the kids were chickens too - when I was challenged to a fight, I'd tell them I'd meet them after school in the park at 3:30pm. I was always there, would wait until 4, and then go home.
None of them ever showed up.
Hahaha...the jokes on you. It was all psychological warfare. They knew you would sit there until four while they were at home laughing and eating milk and cookies. = )
And then there were the devious little boogers that'd ambush you. I once had someone pay a friend of mine to ambush me after school because they knew I wouldn't see that coming. heh
Maybe I'm old fashioned but I don't really see any harm in things like that. It's part of every school kid's life and not all of them turn out to be psychopaths that run into their schools with guns blazing.
Dragynphyre
01-27-05, 08:45 AM
The impression I got from this article was that the pictures were specifically designed to intimidate and instill fear in another individual. They were not "doodles" in the corner of a notebook. They were written threats.
Never underestimate the cruelty of children - these ones just happened to have 'written' evidence of their torture of the other child. Most of the time it's just verbal - and the 'tattler' gets even more hell from the other kids for saying anything about it to a teacher or parent.
I'd never had death threats from other kids, but it came close sometimes. Walking home from school with the fear of whether or not the neighborhood bully was going to jump out behind from those bushes and beat me up that day, or being threatened that a kid and his 10 friends were going to "jump" me after school...
But people have become much more sensitized to juvenlie violence since the tragedy at Columbine, trying to prevent something like that from happening again - maybe to the point of absurdity, IMO.
No doubt DP. I was bully fodder up until about high school. My comment was aimed at the intent of the this specific "art." I think everyone has done some form of morbid doodling in the past with no ill intent. This case appears to have been specifically purposeful.
I'd never had death threats from other kids, but it came close sometimes.
I can remember a few incidences in grade school where kids would come up to me and say something to the nature of "I'll kill you." I've even had someone come up and threaten my grandmother who used to pick me up from school back in first grade. I guess maybe times were different back then because no one freaked out over it. Sure, I was scared for a while, but my parents didn't demand that these kids get thrown in jail or even expelled. I don't even think they went to the point of talking it over with school officials. I was just taught to ignore them and everything was fine. Obviously these kids never killed me. My dad always took things into his own hands. One time, he witnessed a girl picking on me as we were exiting the school. She was relentless, and it bothered my dad. So he chased her across the street into a corner store, and told her that if she bothered me again, that he'd pick her up and stuff her into an arcade game. They never bothered me again since and nothing else happened after that. No retaliation, nothing. I'm willing to bet that if that had happened today, my dad would be sitting in court somewhere, if not in a slammer. But times are different now and for people like you and I who didn't grow up in the times of Columbine, it's hard for us to understand just how serious and touchy people are after that incident. It's understandable, but at the same time, people are also over reacting over small, common issues such as the school bully.
The question then becomes: "Is it better to be overprotective or underprotective?"
It doesn't seem over-protective if it keeps another Columbine from happening, and it doesn't seem under-protective if it means kids can continue to be kids.
It all comes down to a sort of risk / benefits analysis. Is stopping a kid from drawing threats going to keep him from shooting up a school, all the more power to the police. If stopping a kid from having a creative outlet is going to force him to seek real means of venting frustration, well, then we have a new and worse problem.
There isn't really much evidence to suggest either route to be ideal, so people decide to err on the side of caution.
There are some studies that suggest that "venting" frustration actually increases frustration in the short term. I'm not sure on the long-term.
And the rather disturbing finding regarding child porn users who claim they look at child porn so they don't molest children actually having a nearly 100% rate of molesting children anyways. Suggesting that what you do to keep from doing something worse tends to either have no effect or actually increase your chances of doing that "something worse" anyways.
But this is neither here nor there in this case, I'm just strutting off examples as an exercise to help me score higher on coming midterms :D
And the rather disturbing finding regarding child porn users who claim they look at child porn so they don't molest children actually having a nearly 100% rate of molesting children anyways.
Do you realize how many people enjoy child porn? Kids wouldn't make it past 6 without getting molested if that statistic were true.
I mean, ****, look at Japan. Child porn is common as hell. Even more common when you take animation into consideration.
That statistic is only made up to make child pornography more "shocking and wrong".
Don't get me wrong, it is bad, I'm just commenting on how dumb that statistic is.
It's not exactly a statistic, in so far as it's not: "DON'T YOU KNOW 100% OF PORN USERS MURDER BABIES?!?!" in that, in the experience of a couple of criminal psychologists, the majority of those they've dealt with arrested for possession of child pornography have later admitted to sexually abusing a child, after originally stating that they possessed the pornography so they wouldn't.
So these aren't your average child porn users... assuming average child porn users exist. These are the super porn users.
[quote]\
That statistic is only made up to make child pornography more "shocking and wrong".
Please...you can use statistics to prove ANYTHING. 60% of all people know that....