If we keep insisting on putting cops in schools, things like this are never going to stop happening:
A 12-year-old Overland Park girl formed a gun with her fingers, pointed at four of her Westridge Middle School classmates one at a time, and then turned the pretend weapon toward herself.
Police hauled her out of school in handcuffs, arrested her and charged the child with a felony for threatening.
No one wants to talk about this case. Not the police. Not the school. And not the district. But the arrest no one wants to discuss is only the latest arrest of a minor over something extremely minor. Not that you'd assume it was minor if you read the court documents.
[A]ccording to Johnson County District Court documents, on Sept. 18, the girl “unlawfully and feloniously communicated a threat to commit violence, with the intent to place another, in fear, or with the intent to cause the evacuation, lock down or disruption in regular, ongoing activities …” or created just the risk of causing such fear.
This arrest over finger guns follows similar arrests of minors over things no one in their right mind would consider to be criminal acts. But the combination of zero tolerance policies and actual cops roaming school halls, this is what students have been subjected to in the recent past:
- A ten-year-old student arrested for a finger gun-based "threat"
- A seven-year-old suspended for bringing a "weapon" -- a pen that "buzzed" when touched -- to school
- A seven-year-old suspended for brandishing a "gun" he made by taking a strategic bite out of his Pop Tart
- A student suspended for taking a hand-drawn picture of a bomb to school with him [actual drawing posted below]
The school's only statement is that it had nothing to do with the arrest -- that the arrest was entirely law enforcement's decisions. But that assumes school administrators are incapable of exercising discretion. The arrest was made in the principal's office and a school resource officer recommended the student be arrested. No one in the office even attempted to prevent this from happening, apparently. What the SRO recommended is what happened and the school is now trying to distance itself from its complicity in this debacle.
Even assuming the anecdotal background is true, this arrest is still overkill.
A person familiar with a more detailed incident report spoke to The Star on condition of anonymity. The person said that during a class discussion, another student asked the girl, if she could kill five people in the class, who would they be? In response, the girl allegedly pointed her finger pistol — like the ones many children use playing cops and robbers.
This might make the incident a bit more disturbing, but it should not elevate it to the level of a crime -- especially not a felony. But that's what happened. The school may have felt compelled to accept the officer's arrest recommendation. The school may have felt bound by policy to pursue disciplinary action. But this is a 12-year-old surrounded by fully-functioning adults -- none of whom felt compelled to exercise their discretion or common sense. Finger guns on a schoolyard shouldn't result in felony charges. There's a lot of middle ground that no one's exploring and it's going to ruin the lives of students who have no idea their classroom jokes are running headlong into people who let their policies and protocols do all of their thinking for them.
