12 Year Old Student Charged with Felony Sugar Possession

btw strangecraft i do not accept anything the media tells me, seen as the entire worlds media is owned by 5 people. i just know what the system is like, it is that pathetic. there are people on this site who beleive there is a monster in loch ness. now they are asleep (no offence), cos that realy is a bit much. but for the police to hand out 5 years probation for a kilo or even 2 grams of sugar doesnt seem farfetched to me. the police are power mad. i read of a woman who was pulled over for no reason other than a cop wanted to know where she was going. and because the cop wouldnt give a reason for pulling her over, the woman wouldnt tell him where she was going. its non of his business unless shes commited a crime. but because the woman wouldnt tell him, she was charged with assaulting a police officer, this does seem a bit farfetched but hey the story comes from america.

Schools have gone too far attempting to provide a safe drug-free place. My kid has taked many things to school for her home economics class yes including sugar and gasp butterfortunately for us her school seems to have a better grasp on reality. This situation should have been dealt with by the school contacting the parents or better yet let the kid conduct his science experiment. Good Grief lets show some sense.

I guess what bothers me is the concept of "look alike". Here's where the legality goes down the drain. I don't know for sure but I guess that the kid used a small zip-lok bag to put the sugar in. It admittedly would look as standard street packaging for other substances, but heck, zip-loks are ubiquitous. I take all sorts of stuff for lunch, using those. I can imagine I could take a bit of salt in a small zip-lok bag, with me, to salt a salad. It's just way too broad a definition, this look-alike thing.

Unless he was trying to sell the stuff, I say all this prosecution is nuts.

And it doesn't matter what the kid's purpose of using the sugar for was. It's not drugs. It shouldn't be illegal. The end.

pretty much sums it up....

This is absolutely ridiculous....

dr. strangecraft, I don't doubt the kid is lying, but to my mind that's not the point. The point is scale of response. You don't execute people for stealing candy in America, that's not our way. If the above is true, which it is, doesn't it make sense that we would have compunctions about criminalizing a person for life for a stupid joke involving mock drugs at age twelve?

You don't burn down your neighbors house every time the dog takes a crap in your section of the lawn, do you? It's not rational, it's not right.

The punishment should fit the crime. Since this was an incident involving fake drugs, I think some sort of fake punishment is in order. Given the age of the kid, tagging him 'criminal' isn't going to help anyone, not him, not society, nobody.

That system makes things worse, because it railroads people into a life of crime. If you're going to get blamed for every damn thing that happens, you start feeling like maybe you'd be better off actually committing the crimes, at least then you'd profit as well as suffer from your criminal status.

Parolees have it hard in this country. Felons are like a goldmine for employeers, because you can crap all over them and if they complain you can throw them back in jail. They end up at the worst jobs, working twice as hard for less money, and always with the sword hanging above their heads. A lot of these guys have committed victimless crimes, and the treatment they receive is a national disgrace.

Then I turn around, and see adult rapists getting probation, or 30 days in jail, or a few months of prison and some half-hearted 'therapy' with a bunch of other pervs. Used to be in this country, we executed the rapists and child molesters, and parents didn't need the state to discipline their children. What happened? :shk:

What you say is true, and I don't deny it.

On the other hand, there is the other side of the argument.

-The odds are probably about 3 to 1 that he will never be found guilty, but will instead be offered an ajudicated sentence. This how the majority of such cases are handled. Basically, the court procedings are halted, and you agree to a voluntary probation. If you break that probation, particularly with another drug-related crime, they will pick up the prior case and procede with it in addition to your new offense. This doesn't tag the kid in any way. If a cop runs a wanted check on the kid, he will get "ajudicated" on the return, but in most states it won't tell you what the problem was. You have to arrest 'em and bring 'em in, and call their home county to find out. All of which will require probable cause on a NEW incedent.

- Even if he is not offered an ajudicated sentence, the prosecutor will probably offer to let him plead guilty to a lesser charge, i.e. solicitation of drugs, etc. Which is usually a class C or B misd. In other words, his parents will pay a traffic ticket.


On a deeper level . . .

I agree with you completely, that it is immoral to brand a person for life; particularly for a youthful indescretion. But what is our other choice? Pretend he hasn't done anything wrong?

Do you honestly expect that his parents are going to do anything about this? Most of the time (as in say, 9 times out of 10), the parents will scream about how their little angel has been framed, and then pull all their strings with the country club set to have you brought up for an "unscheduled performance review" in front of your captain.

If I told you that I strongly suspect that this kid is already, or about to become involved in coc aine trafficking, I'm sure you'll say that i'm a bigot, and am labeling him for life.

But tell me honestly, why do you think he was waiving around a packet of powder in the bathroom? I'll tell you why. Because he idolizes the drug culture, that's why.

If you'd rather do some sort of intervention or whatever, go ahead and try. But base on my experience in law enforcement, the parents will do everything in their power to keep you from talking honestly with little Billie about how he is about to start down the wrong path in life. If you offer to take him to a psychiatrist, drug counselor, scared straight program, etc., I will bet $100 that the parents will sue you for interfering with their parental rights to raise a thug.

So by all means, even though we've caught a kid at the moment when he is most at risk, let's throw him back into that boys bathroom with all the other kids, shut the door, and burn all the records.

That way we can pretend to be shocked when he DOES end up dealing.

Maybe we can blame that on the system, too.

.

Its still up to parents to raise kids. I guess you could say he is going to be scared straight by this charge? This may be true, however it could also backfire and turn in into more of a rebel. This is a tough issue to ..TRY.. to keep drugs away from kids. I would hope the parents are heavily invovlved in his life and steer him in the right direction.
I agree that a felony charge is just DUMB! It follows you forever even if your a JUVY. I would have liked that they called his parents and handled it that way.

Why the hell would a kid get charged with a felony for bring friggin sugar to school. If he gets sent to jail I am gonna be all This is soo damn stupid. Its not frigging crack and it was not meant to look like crack so why a felony charge if it was a simple misunderstanding. Anyway cant the teacher vouch for him if it was a project for his class. Its not the greatest idea to bring the sugar in but its not a felony. god d--- the facists that think this stuff up.

What you say is true, and I don't deny it.

Well good, I'm glad we got that cleared up...

Wait, what's this? There's more? Well that shouldn't be...

But what is our other choice? Pretend he hasn't done anything wrong?

I don't think we have to pretend, honestly. Who was victimized? Who was injured? Was anyone effected besides the kid (not counting wasted time on the part of the PD and the school).

If the kid had been trying to pass Drano off as blow, I can see a clear public health concern. The kid endangered people, in that scenario. In THIS scenario, he exposed them to a substance that, while dangerous, is ubiquitous in the modern Western diet.

Do you honestly expect that his parents are going to do anything about this? Most of the time (as in say, 9 times out of 10), the parents will scream about how their little angel has been framed, and then pull all their strings with the country club set to have you brought up for an "unscheduled performance review" in front of your captain.

No, I don't expect his parents are going to do anything, but I think we should be able to expect at least that much, in a modern civilized society. The problem, and there definitely is a problem, comes back to the severe shortage of responsible parents.

Why is it that most kids can't read and write and speak properly by the time they make it to school? Why don't these kids have any sense of responsiblity for their own behavior? Why are they so violent and selfish, so petulant and cruel towards their peers and their teachers?

I think it's pretty clear that our permissive, self-obsessed society is to blame, along with the parents who think having a child means changing diapers and changing channels and little else. :shk:

There's clearly a problem, and the sooner we deal with it as a nation, the better.

But the problem is not that little Johnny brought a bag of sugar to school...

If I told you that I strongly suspect that this kid is already, or about to become involved in coc aine trafficking, I'm sure you'll say that i'm a bigot, and am labeling him for life.

As long as your suspicion doesn't translate into a bogus, trumped-up, malicious prosecution of the kid, it has no relevance. I share your suspicion, honestly I do. As I've said from the beginning, I doubt the kid is a solid citizen, and I'm almost positive his whole story was nonsense. But that doesn't change the fact that what he did, while stupid and quite telling, was not a crime.

Not a crime by any logical definition, anyway.

If we had a time machine, we could go back and give the parents another chance at NOT screwing up their kid. But we don't have a time machine

That means we have to settle for changing attitudes and engendering responsibility and dedication in prospective parents.

A custodian at the school phoned the cops without first speaking with the boy.

Blame the school policy.

Sugar experiment lol.
The boy wants to be a drug dealer, let him feel the heat.

lol? what if the kid wasn't lying

what if he was using it so other people wouldn't beat him up over scaming them with offers of drugs

why do you say he would be a drug dealer

why would he need to lie over !SUGAR!