The case of the 11-year old butter knife felon
Girl arrested for butter knife in backpack
An 11-year-old sixth-grade student at Fox Chapel Middle School in the Hernando County School District was suspended for 10 days when a butter knife was discovered in her backpack. She was also handcuffed and arrested for third degree weapon possession.
“She’s, like, “I don’t get it,”‘ the mother said of her daughter. “Why am I getting in trouble for this?”‘
Here’s why, said Deputy Donna Black, spokeswoman for the Hernando County Sheriff’s Office: “For bringing weapons onto school property, there is zero tolerance. It’s been that way for years. And this is not just here. That’s nationwide.”
According to Florida law possessing any weapon on a school campus “including a razor, box cutter or knife” is a felony. Deputy Black explained that a butter knife is a knife and therefore a weapon according to law.
School officials do not seem keen on discussing the matter.
The county’s schools were closed Monday because of Hurricane Wilma. But when reached at his home Monday morning, Dave Schoelles, the principal at Fox Chapel, said he was out of town last week and didn’t know the particulars.
“I’m not going to have any comment on it,” he said.
…
Fox Chapel Parent Teacher Student Association president Sheri Noriega did not return a phone message left on Monday afternoon at her home.Messages also were left for all five members of the School Board.
No response.
That’s par for the course. Just what could you say to defend this action?
Contact Information: (Note that these email addresses are interpreted based on the district email address guidelines. No email contact information for any administrative member is published on the district or school websites.)
Principal Wendy Tellone
School Board Chairperson Jim Malcolm
School Board Member Pat Fagan
School Board Member
The lack of discretion by police in this case is really scary. Reading the quotes by Deputy Black as to the technical status of the law used for the case, one sees a blind application of the code with little discretion or reasoning. The use of the term “felony” in the technical justification for the police response to the school system complaint leaves one wondering what might have happend if the suspect had got scared and ran. Technically the police might have used deadly force to stop a fleeing felon, and shot the 11 year old “criminal”
From the story: “This started not because of the butter knife, according to the arrest report, but because of a small, clear-plastic vial with a purple lid that was in the girl’s book bag. The vial contained a white powder. The girl told school administrators that it was “glitter” - her makeup.”
It’s unclear whether this stuff is serious makeup or a toy, but either way this tidbit speaks to pretty permissive parenting. Parents shouldn’t let 11-year-old girls wear glitter makeup to school, and/or children need to be taught at an early age that they should NEVER bring toys–or any personal possession not directly related to schoolwork–to school. A number of these incidents stem from the failure by parents to keep a tighter rein on what objects are leaving the house with the kid. Had mom forbidden the vial, the knife might never have been discovered. It should also be noticed that the story notes in passing that the girl has been suspended twice for fighting. Clearly this kid was on administrators’ radar, not somebody plucked randomly out of the student body for persecution.
But just because the kid is a bit of a handful doesn’t justify what was done here. This incident seems similar to the “cake knife” incident last year, a completely harmless object and a massive overreaction. The incident should never have been reported to police. I can see a few days suspension, but handcuffing a child and charging her with a felony is reprehensible foolishness.
Zero tolerance has two primary purposes. 1) To take decision making away from individual administrators. This is to avoid lawsuits by decisions that end up with bad results. 2) To condition the populace to government interference in every aspect of their lives. PC has the same goal. Once you are unsure what you can do or think, controlling you is easy.
Riiight Bill - 11 year girls NEVER wear glitter makeup. And they don’t dot their i’s with little hearts either. And they’ve never been know to scream like… like… like little school girls at Brittney Spears concerts. Anyone tells you otherwise, it’s indicative of bad parenting.
-K
Bad parenting???? Because she took glitter make up to school????? Have you never had an 11 year old child eager to show off her possessions to her peers???
Obviously you have not worked with the truly “bad parenting” element in this society - the ones who carve wooden instruments to use in sexually molesting their young children - the ones who starve their 4 years olds and hide their dead bodies in picnic coolers…..letting a child take glitter make up to school doesn’t even get into the bad parenting chapter in my book…..
The lack of critical thinking on the part of the school and law enforcement is astounding and any attempt to frame this as a “bad parenting” example is equally toxic.
Bill, come on. The kid deserves to be punished because she has bad parenting? And your evidence of this “bad parenting” was that she had “glitter” make-up and got into fights?
Claire’s sells glitter make-up by the pound. Anyone that confuses it with a crack vial needs to get a clue.
As far as fights go: You ever think that maybe she didn’t start the fights? The story doesn’t say she did. Maybe some knucklehead picked on her and she was defending herself.
I have a friend that got suspended for “fighting” because he *dodged* a punch. My friend didn’t even lay a hand on the guy and walked away from the situation. If he let the guy beat him up, he wouldn’t have gotten in trouble.
It always bothers me when school administrators can brush off questions about poor decisions with a “no comment” copout. If you make the decision, you better be prepared to explain it to the parents, or to anyone the parents authorize. School officials should be required to answer such questions and provide documentation unless they have an specific reason for not doing so.
Perhaps the worst part, though, is that the police obviously do not know the difference between a “weapon” and a metal object that is less likely to cause injury than a well-sharpened pencil.
If you look back in American History, you will see that the purpose of public schooling was always control. The idea of free public education controlled by the government was imported to this country from Prussia (a nation notorious for its commitment to liberty and freedom of thought). Horace Mann and Johy Dewey promoted the idea with the goal of creating pliable masses for the Industrial Economy (http://www.mackinac.org/article.aspx?ID=3256 as an example) Anyone who thinks that public schooling aims at freedom, education or critical thinking has been lulled to sleep by the fantasy that was the 40’s and 50’s. We will never be a truly free society until two institutions are abolished — Public Schools and the IRS. Reform will never be enough; the system of public education is rotten from its very roots and inception.
Hmm.. Perhaps they should arrest the cafeteria ladies, too. You know, because of all the horribly dangerous butter knives they hoard in the kitchen.
(/sarcasm)
Having just come across this story and going over each reply, most people took A LOT for granted and became pointlessly defensive in their responses! The person with the most sense was Bill. He made a very good point: what’s going in a child’s backpack, what they’re wearing, how they conduct themselves, and their general attitude is the responsibility of the parents BEFORE the child walks out the front door and takes part in any social situation (party, school, going out to eat). To do any less than take full responsibility is, in fact, bad parenting. To say that molestation and murder is ANY kind of parenting is off the charts! If a person has to compare something to molestation to make a point you have big, giant, huge problems. “Yeah well SOME parents rape and murder their kids so this silly little thing of putting a knife in her bag is okeydokey in my book”. Good grief.
Getting into fights IS cause for concern. Whether one is the attacker or attacked, you deserve the reprimand and warning, either way. There’s no such thing as a completely innocent person. And the most important question of all… what on god’s green earth would require a student to bring a butter knife to school??
Although nobody here disagree’s that arresting the girl for said reasons is over-the-top extremist control, the surrounding circumstances do bring up some very good questions about the lax parenting going on that led upto the arrest. If people would take greater personal responsibility the government and all it’s divisions would not and could not extend their reach to such absurd degree’s as this. You, me, we all allow this to go on and escalate by being so excusatory and in complete denial of our responsibilities.
And the Most unfortunate of all is, even after all the work put into this site, the purpose behind it, and all that it tries to do… So many of it’s readers have no common sense! - which is something any amount of intelligence could never compensate for.
PS: ‘Here, here’ to abolishing Public Schooling!