Boys suspended for tiny G.I. Joe guns
District's
zero-tolerance policy bars inch-long plastic toy
Posted:
© 2004 WorldNetDaily.com
Three boys were suspended
for bringing to school miniature toy guns from G.I. Joe action figures.
The toys are about one to
three inches – about half the size of a pencil – but Bemiss
Elementary School in Spokane, Wash., says it stands by its zero-tolerance
policy on weapons, which does not specify the type or size, the Spokane
Spokesman-Review reported.
"We've been very clear
with our students and parents that you don't bring anything that resembles a
gun to school," Bemiss Principal Lorna Spear
told the paper.
The mother of one of the
boys, Terry Wilson-Spence, called their suspension Friday an overreaction.
"I don't think any
child would look at it and be threatened," she told he
School officials argue,
however, "At school you don't need anything that's going to make kids feel
unsafe."
Wilson-Spence's son, John Spence,
ran into trouble Friday when he put three plastic toy guns in his pocket as he
was leaving for school.
His mother said he packed
the toys in preparation for an overnight birthday party, and when he got to
school one of the guns was sticking out.
"Apparently when he
got to school, one of the guns was sticking out," Wilson-Spence said.
The principal, Spear, said
another child reported the guns to school officials.
The officials say during
lunch, Spence and two other unidentified boys, who also had miniature guns,
began to play with them at the lunch table.
Spear said the three boys
were making threatening actions while playing with the toys, which made other
students feel unsafe.
Wilson-Spence admitted one
of the boys pointed the tiny plastic gun at other students but insists her son
did not.
The school district's
Student Rights and Responsibilities policy guide says a threat is considered
"any statement, written or spoken, or action which creates a reasonable
fear of bodily harm."
"I think that we need
to be clear about what constitutes a threat, and what is plain and simply a
toy," Wilson-Spence told the Spokesman-Review. "We're talking about
Barbie and Ken here."
Spear was away Friday and
said the boys would be suspended until she met with their parents when she
returned this week.
The punishment will depend
on the circumstances, she said.
"Even these boys said
they knew they weren't supposed to bring these to school," noted Spear,
who added the situation would have amounted to nothing if they had given the
toys to a teacher.
The
Related story:
4th-grader suspended
for gun shell in pocket
Campus
sponsors 'Camouflage Day,'
kicks out boy due to 'zero tolerance'
Posted:
By Joe Kovacs
© 2002 WorldNetDaily.com
When 9-year-old Jonathan
Cross dressed up in his duck-hunting outfit for his school's Camouflage Day
this week, he never dreamed his love for the sport would backfire on him.
Covered from head to toe in
his gear, the fourth-grader was "a very happy camper," according to
his mother, excited to show off his new hunting boots, hat, mesh face mask,
shirt, bib, pants and boots.
But there was something in
his pocket he had forgotten about – a shotgun shell left over from an outing
with his father and brothers last weekend.
His discovery of the item
while on campus has left the straight-A student stunned with a five-day
suspension, his teachers in tears, and his parents perplexed over the latest
case of "zero tolerance" in the government school system.
"They shouldn't have
had Camouflage Day," said Kay Cross, Jonathan's mother. "It's
militaristic; it has connotations of violence. He just happened to have a shell
in his pocket."
The incident unfolded at
the Fred A.
Anderson Elementary School, located in the rural town of
The school, like many
others across America, takes part in "Spirit Week," featuring
different themes each day designed to motivate children. One day is
Professional Dress Day, where students dress themselves in the attire of
working adults. Another one is Mismatch Day, where children can suit themselves
in colors and items that clash. Tuesday was Camouflage Day.
Jonathan had been dropped
off by his mother and was waiting with other early arrivers in the lunchroom
before being dispatched to class. It was in the lunchroom that he felt
something in his pocket. When he took it out to see what it was, he realized it
was a shotgun shell, as did a teacher who caught a glimpse.
The boy was brought to the
principal's office, and because of the school's zero-tolerance policy for
weapons and explosive devices, officials say they had no choice but to suspend
him for five days, even if there was no intent to use the device.
"A shotgun shell is
considered an explosive," said Cathy Dunbar, the school's assistant
principal. "We do have some discretion for the number of days [for
suspension]. We kind of go with five. ... It's not like we really wanted to
come down hard on him. We didn't."
"It never crossed our
minds," she told WorldNetDaily. "We didn't
think kids would have something in their pockets. [Camouflage Day] is really a
very innocent thing."
Mrs. Cross is not laying
entire blame on school officials, whom she says are truly remorseful, telling
her Camouflage Day would not take place in the future. She says she should have
checked her son's pockets, but what's upsetting to her and many American
parents is the rigidness of zero-tolerance policies
designed to keep the classroom safe.
"Zero tolerance comes
from a good place," says Cross, "but it's black and white; there is
no gray. There's a common-sense point of view that gets overlooked with this
black-and-white law. There's no blurring of the edges, no extenuating
circumstances."
That point is echoed by the
Rutherford Institute, a Virginia-based
civil-liberties and human-rights organization that has dealt with many similar
cases in the legal system.
|
|
|
President of the Rutherford
Institute John Whitehead says zero-tolerance policies are 'spreading like a
disease.' |
"[Zero tolerance]
teaches kids a bad lesson," says institute president John Whitehead.
"Make the slightest mistake and the state authority is gonna
come down on you like gangbusters. No hearing, no appeal. ... What's the
rationale for expelling a student for having a Certs
mint or gargling with Scope after lunch? These are actual cases."
The institute has handled
high-profile incidents, like that of Virginia
eighth-grader Ben Ratner who prevented a suicidal
friend from slitting her wrists by taking away her knife, only to face
automatic suspension for possessing a weapon in his locker.
The
A
federal appeals court upheld the expulsion, stating the facts didn't
demonstrate that "the school's policy in this case failed to comport with
the United States Constitution." The Supreme Court subsequently refused to
consider if Ratner's constitutional rights had been
violated, thus affirming the discipline by local officials.
As WorldNetDaily previously reported, students have also
been suspended for playing "cops and robbers" during recess, drawing
a picture of a Confederate flag, using nail clippers and stating the intent to
launch spitballs.
The list of events gaining
national attention in recent years also includes:
- A National Merit Scholar prevented from
attending her own high-school graduation last year in
- An 11-year-old fifth-grader permanently banned
from an elementary school in
- A 12-year-old honor student in
- A 9-year-old handing out Certs
mints in
- And in
Harsh zero-tolerance
policies have been adopted by educators across the
In June 2000, the Civil Rights Project at
Harvard University released a report
on the issue, stating a great deal of evidence supports the conclusion
"that children are being unfairly suspended and arbitrarily kicked out of
school for incidents that could have been very easily handled using alternative
methods."
"As a result, everyday
zero-tolerance policies force children to be suspended or expelled for sharing
Midol, asthma medication (during an emergency), cough drops, and for bringing
toy guns, nail clippers and scissors to school. Even the common schoolyard
scuffle has become a target, regardless of severity and circumstances,"
the report said.
Despite the publicity
surrounding recent cases, Whitehead says the situation for students is not
getting any better.
"[The districts] are
not listening," he says. "It's the lockdown of
Back in Oriental, N.C.,
Jonathan Cross has an unexpected 11-day break, as his suspension will merge
into next week's Thanksgiving holiday.
His mother personally met
with school officials and has no intention of pursuing any kind of legal
action, as administrators were simply enforcing
"I don't have a bent
against the school," she said. "I'm still pissed, but I'm
satisfied."