N.J. High School Student Banned After Setting Teen's Turban on Fire

[ckramer]

Source: fn

HIGHTSTOWN, N.J. — Officials are banning a Hightstown high school senior from school and all activities after he was charged with setting fire to a student's turban.

Garrett Green will have home instruction. The 18-year-old won't be allowed to attend the prom or graduation.

Green and his parents are scheduled to meet with school officials Wednesday and he's also due in Municipal Court.

Authorities say the senior torched a 16-year-old's turban during a fire drill on May 5. The junior, who is a member of the Sikh faith, was singed but not seriously hurt.

Green is charged with arson and criminal mischief.



Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,355622,00.html

---

[NJmaverick]

1. "arson and criminal mischief"

the same charges he would have faced if he set a garbage can on fire.

[MnFats]

28. depending on the degree, 'arson' could easily be a felony... BUT

there should be an assault charge in there, too. assault with a weapon, also a felony in most states.

[MissMillie]

2. Arson and mischief?

Not assault?

:shrug:

[The Magistrate]

3. Green Needs To Do Some Jail Time, Sir, Pour Encourager Les Autres....

[JerseygirlCT]

34. D'accord nt

[murielm99]

4. He's not charged with assault or attempted murder?

Sikh men don't cut their hair, do they? A fire could kill.

[no_hypocrisy]

6. Attempted murder I can see as there was a reckless indifference to life

demonstrated here.

[RaleighNCDUer]

5. And why was he not charged with assault? nt

[Renew Deal]

7. Idiot

He probably won't be allowed to graduate either. That just fucked up his life.

[havocmom]

8. Sadly, without SERIOUS punishment & mental health treatment,

he may well become even more angry and take it out on people he thinks (with his sick mind) are the reason his life is fucked up.

[cyndensco]

14. Not graduating should be the least of his problems.

He committed a criminal act and has to be treated as such.

[High Plains]

9. Wow, the DU punisher posse is out in force.

It looks like the kid is facing a felony and a misdemeanor for his stupid stunt in which no one was "seriously hurt." Prosecutors are not typically known for undercharging people. I'm inclined to side with the prosecutors on this one (and you don't hear me saying that very often!).

[Solon]

10. If I fire a gun at you, and miss...

wouldn't I still be charged with either assault or attempted murder? Just because the 16 year old got lucky doesn't reduce the senior's responsibility.

[High Plains]

22. Was this attempted murder or a stupid (maybe racist) prank?

I don't know. All the information I have is from the story in the OP. Are you suggesting the prosecutors are undercharging this kid?

[TechBear_Seattle]

11. Suppose I set your hat on fire

If you escaped serious harm, then it was only a stupid stunt, right? What if your hat was a yarmulke or a headscarf, and the "stunt" had the flavor of a hate crime?

[High Plains]

23. Suppose you set my hat on fire.

I'd probably turn around and punch you in the nose. But that's just me.

I don't know if this was a "hate crime." Do you?

I guess my issue here is broader than this particular kid. It's the seeming criminalization of damned near everything. The kids gets suspended from school, he misses graduation, and he gets charged with a felony and a misdemeanor. And that's not enough for a sizeable contingent of progressives?

[stillcool]

12. Funny how 'justice' works...

different strokes for different folks.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0703120170mar12,1,1921178.story?coll=chi
To some in Paris, sinister past is back
In Texas, a white teenager burns down her family's home and receives probation. A black one shoves
a hall monitor and gets 7 years in prison. The state NAACP calls it 'a signal to black folks.'
By Howard Witt
Tribune senior correspondent
Published March 12, 2007
----------------------------------------------
There was the 19-year-old white man, convicted last July of criminally negligent homicide for killing a 54-year-old black woman and her 3-year-old grandson with his truck, who was sentenced in Paris to probation and required to send an annual Christmas card to the victims' family.

There are the Paris public schools, which are under investigation by the U.S. Education Department after repeated complaints that administrators discipline black students more frequently, and more harshly, than white students.

And then there is the case that most troubles Cherry and leaders of the Texas NAACP, involving a 14-year-old black freshman, Shaquanda Cotton, who shoved a hall monitor at Paris High School in a dispute over entering the building before the school day had officially begun.The youth had no prior arrest record, and the hall monitor--a 58-year-old teacher's aide--was not seriously injured. But Shaquanda was tried in March 2006 in the town's juvenile court, convicted of "assault on a public servant" and sentenced by Lamar County Judge Chuck Superville to prison for up to 7 years, until she turns 21.
Just three months earlier, Superville sentenced a 14-year-old white girl, convicted of arson for burning down her family's house, to probation.

[JI7]

13. required to send an annual Christmas card to the victims' family.

wtf is that ? why would the victim's family even want that from him.

[stillcool]

15. I'm sure it had nothing to do...

with what the victim's family "wanted". It's how justice is meted out.

[8 track mind]

18. I LIVED in this town...

and it's quite scary. This is one place in the USA where 60's racism is alive and well. Blacks are denied houses in certain parts of town and are typically treated like a second class citizens. The majority of the black students in town are "funneled" into Paris High School, while most of the white students go to North Lamar ISD. I was more than overjoyed when Ms. Cotton's story made it into the national news. In high school it was the norm for teachers to frequently use the N-word in the presence of white students. As a teenager during the summer months, i worked for a motorcycle shop in Paris that was owned by a black man and I was CONSTANTLY harassed by the Paris police for this. Bullshit traffic stops, that sort of thing. I didn't quit though, i would not give them the pleasure. Bear in mind that all of this happened in the early nineties. It should come as no surprise that they let the Ku Klux Klowns hold a rally at the courthouse in 1995, making things even worse. This would be the same court house that the NAACP protested at on Ms Cotton's behalf.

As for Chuck Superville, he's your average racist repuke dickhead. More than likely he knew the white girl's family and he did them a favor. It happens far too often in that dump. I'm glad i got the hell out of there as soon as i could.

[noonwitch]

20. A note about a juvenile sentence

A juvenile sentence means up to 7 years, not 7 years. The kid's release from juvie (or from a "residential treatment facility") will be dependent on the kid's progress in whatever program he is in. Most likely, the kid will be in treatment for about 6 months to a year-I doubt the kid would be sent to a state reformatory for a first offense, so he will likely go a to private institution (not a prison for profit, but a non-profit kid's program), where he will receive counseling and confrontational group therapy.

Juveniles don't get a sentence of a term of years. If the kid is sentenced as a juvenile for murder or rape, he most likely will be incarcerated until he is 21. Otherwise, the kid has to make progress toward his treatment goals in order to be released, and will have probation following his residential treatment. For the kids at the time, it's sort of a Catch-22, in that they don't get a sentence with an out date (except their 21st birthday, 19th for less serious offenses, 18th for status offenders). But to get a term of years, one is sentenced as an adult, and that record doesn't ever go away.

[stillcool]

25. Do you think the 14 year old girl...

should have been sentenced to a juvenile jail for an indeterminate sentence of up to 7 years for pushing a hall monitor? Or does that not matter because 7 years might not mean 7 years? It was only because of the national exposure this story got that she was released after spending 1 year in the facility.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0703310265mar31,1,4935841.story

TRIBUNE UPDATE
Girl in prison for shove gets released early
Teen is first of possible hundreds to be freed from a scandal-ridden juvenile justice system

By Howard Witt | Tribune senior correspondent
March 31, 2007


HOUSTON - Shaquanda Cotton, the black teenager in the small east Texas town of Paris whose prison sentence of up to 7 years for shoving a teacher's aide sparked nationwide controversy, was released Saturday.

Her release, ordered by a special conservator appointed to overhaul the state's scandal-ridden juvenile prison system, was the first of what could be hundreds as a panel of civil rights leaders begins reviewing the sentences of every youth incarcerated by the Texas Youth Commission to weed out those being held arbitrarily.

"We have no confidence in the system that was in place," said Jim Hurley, spokesman for the conservator, Jay Kimbrough. "And this case is an example of what we expect to happen if something wrong has been done to youths being held inside that system."

Cotton, who is 15, had no prior criminal record when she was incarcerated a year ago under an indeterminate sentence that could have lasted until her 21st birthday. Her case rose to national prominence and became the focus of ongoing civil rights protests after a March 12 Tribune story detailed how a 14-year-old white girl convicted of the more serious crime of arson was sentenced to probation by the same judge.
------------------------------
Since she has been in prison, Shaquanda Cotton said that she had grown despondent surrounded by other youths who were hardened criminals, and that she had tried to commit suicide. Her sentence, which ultimately was up to the discretion of prison officials, had twice been extended, first because she would not admit her guilt as required by prison regulations and then because she was found with "contraband" in her cell -- an extra pair of socks.

Those sentence extensions drew the attention of Kimbrough, who was confirmed by the state Senate on Thursday as conservator of the youth prison system, which has been rocked by a sex scandal over allegations that guards and administrators coerced inmates for sex.

Kimbrough, a former deputy attorney general, said last week that he was convening a special committee to examine the sentences of all 4,700 youths in Texas juvenile prisons to determine how many might have had their sentences unfairly extended by prison authorities -- and that Shaquanda Cotton's was the first case he intended to review.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/28/us/28youth.html?ex=11...
By RALPH BLUMENTHAL
Published: February 28, 2007
Texan Calls for Takeover of State’s Juvenile Schools
AUSTIN, Tex., Feb. 27 — A long-simmering scandal over sexual abuse of juveniles at schools for youthful offenders broke into the open on Tuesday with an outraged state senator calling for a takeover of the troubled Texas Youth Commission.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Senators questioned Mr. Nichols about the transfer in 2003 of one supervisor, Ray Brookins, to the West Texas State School from another school for juvenile offenders at San Saba, after pornography had been found on his computer. Mr. Brookins later became assistant superintendent at Pyote and was cited by the Texas Rangers for sexual contact with juveniles there, senators said.Another supervisor at Pyote, John Paul Hernandez, was also reported by the Texas Rangers to have engaged in sexual contact with students, senators said.

Both supervisors left the youth agency and are under investigation, said the Ward County district attorney, Randall Reynolds.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Mr. Hernandez became principal at a charter school in Midland, the Richard Milburn
Academy, said Norman Hall, the school’s superintendent. The school did not know of Mr. Hernandez’s history when it hired him, Mr. Hall said, and put him on leave several weeks ago.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
The superintendent at Pyote, Chip Harrison, who knew of the accusations against Mr. Brookins and Mr. Hernandez and kept them on the staff, senators said, is now director of juvenile corrections for the commission, in charge of several schools.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Mr. Nichols called him “one of our most experienced superintendents,” setting off a gasp from parents.
Stacie Semrad contributed reporting.

[noonwitch]

27. She probably should have been on probation, but Texas is Texas

They have their own way of doing things there. I don't think she should have been charged, to begin with, for shoving someone. There could be more to the story-like it wasn't the first time she shoved that person, or she'd been warned repeatedly for aggressive behavior in the past.

But if she is suicidal, the agency charged with her care can't release her or they are liable if she were to actually commit suicide after being released. It keeps her from "making her level", in behavior modification terminology.

[stillcool]

30. Did you even read the story?

There were numerous articles printed about this. She had no record whatsoever. She was there for a year, and you think she should not have been released because she attempted suicide? Well...she was released!!! No thanks to those who think it is just fine to lock up kids for 'pushing'. "Behavior Modification" Indeed.

[KamaAina]

17. Egging another kid's locker is a "stupid stunt"

this is a hate crime.

[High Plains]

24. Is it a hate crime? I don't have sufficient data to say one way or the other.

[LanternWaste]

29. However...

"I don't have sufficient data to say one way or the other."

However, with the current mood of the nation, our collective xenophobia, and our rampant racism, coupled with the fact that he did in fact set the the turban of a student who practices minority religion on fire, leads to the reasonable conclusion that it was indeed a hate crime.

Do we know this with absolute certainty? No-- and no one is claiming that. We are simply short handing the reasonable conclusion until we see "sufficient data" to the contrary...

[hlthe2b]

19. It was a hate crime and put another at serious risk for injury...

He needs, at a minimum, court ordered counseling if we don't want a repeat, or worse.

[Maine-i-acs]

16. Sadly, this little f***er will be revered by a small segment ...

Glen Beck will probably be applauding him tonight; if I had the stomach for it I would watch to see.

Expect some fancy executive job offer or low-key scholarship to an elite university to follow.

[La Lioness Priyanka]

21. ugh

[devilgrrl]

26. There's a Sikh guy at work who hasn't worn his turban since 9/11...

for fear of having something like the OP happen to him.

[La Lioness Priyanka]

31. right after 9/11 some one ran down a sikh guy in LI, saying he was doing it for his country

[devilgrrl]

35. There was also an incident in Arizona, some redneck shot a Sikh guy thinking that he was Arab

Probably the uncle of the assholes who staged the pro-gun rally at Champp's.

[JerseygirlCT]

32. How about attempted murder?

Good heavens, where do people get these violent urges? I truly don't understand it.

[DU GrovelBot]

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