Who’s High? A School Suspends a Student for Bloodshot Eyes

This is simply ridiculous.

In Trophy Club, Texas, 16-year-old Kyler Robertson chose to attend classes just two days after his father was stabbed to death. His mother had urged the grief-stricken boy to stay home, according to a report on the local Fox News station, but Kyler said he wanted the comfort of his friends.

Administrators at Byron Nelson High School didn’t let the boy stay on campus for long. Because of his irritated eyes and, they claimed, the smell of marijuana on his clothes, school officials said they suspected Kyler of using marijuana and sent him home Tuesday with a three-day suspension. The school said it would lift the suspension within two hours if Kyler passed a drug test — which he did.

SOURCE: healthland.time.com...

So, they "smelled" marijuana, yet he passed the drug test (which he should have never taken in my opinion). So, if it wasn't marijuana they smelled, then what was it? Was this "dirty tactics" being employed by school administrators so that they could push their agenda? I don't know if this student has any legal recourse, but if it were me, I would sue the pants off this school district and file a defamation law suit against those that claimed to have smelled the marijuana.

That's a disgrace.
Is Texas tring to replace Kansas as the dumbest state in the Union?
Seriously, it's a classic example of mindless bad judgement.

LOL - so the school administrators KNOW what marijuana smells like? Reeeeally? Now how would they know that? Is there a "marijuana smell" training course I'm unaware of?

The kid may just stink. That doesn't mean he has "skunk" on him. Ohhhh.....but he has "red eyes", well then my dear Watson, we must have a REEFER HEAD in our presence. ARREST HIM!!!!!


So this kid is grieving, and instead of counsel him and help him through this difficult period, they accuse him of drug use and kick him out. Nice. Shows you how much they care (they don't).

Any counselor educated in developmental/social psychology should know that kids/teenagers are MUCH more prone to experimenting with drugs after the loss of a loved one, especially a parent. That doesn't mean they are bad kids, it means THEY NEED HELP. Don't reject them, work with them for f---'s sake.

everybody is so brainwashed into beleiving marijuana is so bad, i see this as testament to that. it's gotten so bad in this country, that a school would be THIS ACUTELY interested in this kind of thing.

i got detention in 5th grade for being "high" and i didnt even know what drugs were at the time. i went from wearin coke bottles to contacts and everyonee started sayin i was high.

The dumbest part about this is that tons of pot smokers don't get red eyes ever.

Which is really funny. Because it's usually the super stressed out folks with the bloodshot eyes.

Allergies can also be a major cause of blood-shot eyes.

These school administrators got caught straight up LYING about smelling weed. The kid passed the drug test. He should SUE the hell out of them for LYING and trying to destroy his life further.

The poor kid's father was stabbed to death just a few days prior? Omg.

Sue them!!!

reply to post by harrytuttle


i don't know about every school in the USA, but i know during my highschool years one of my teachers told me that the school police officer sat down with him and a group of teachers and lit up what looked like herb in a bowl and the bowl was passed around all the teachers so they could smell what marijuana smells like. he said it wasn't marijuana, but something that smelt like it when burned, the only reason he told me is because he thought it was sort of funny seeing all the teachers in a circle like that as if they were 'hanging out getting stoned'

and that brings me back to my original point, the chrisis of this country that we have gotten to the point of THIS kind of attention and waste of time/money on marijuana - and all via the lies and disinformation of the government and anti-marijuana groups

reply to post by Aggie Man


I see no problem with making him take the drug test under "normal" conditions, but this was certainly not a normal day!

The school administration should have been motivated by helping this poor kid integrate back into school following a tragedy. They should have readily known that his eyes were going to be irritated after 2 days of torment. They should have used common sense, and even if they did smell something odd, they should have given him the benefit of the doubt for the time being. If he is a problem student, they would have had ample opportunity to address it a week or two down the road. Why give him and his mother more heartache on top of heartache?

Suppose this kid had left the school after being suspended and committed suicide. The tox screening would have come back clean and the school would have been liable for his death! It is their job to counsel young minds, and this kid needed their support not their accusations.

I don't know if they have a lawsuit, since everything turned out ok, but those administrators better hope that he doesn't have an uncle like me living in the same town with them. It would be impossible for them to go grocery shopping or pumping gas or out to a nice dinner with their family if I were in that town. I would be sure to publicly berate them every chance I got until they had to move to a new city. I would push the letter of the law and pray that they crossed the line so that I could "defend" myself physically!

ill look for the link but the school allready apologized and creditied him those days as excused absences instead of suspensions and they are in the process of making it right and clearing his permanent record and it is rumored that they will be publicly aplogizeing to him for it but i dunno about that last part hope i helped im off to find the link


www.kwtx.com...
www.kfdm.com...

The only way to make this right is to fire the school administrators.

Apologies don't mean crap.

Fire these LYING SCUMBAGS!

Or else no justice will ever be had!

Cuz they will do it again and again.

Here is the problem with the entire issue and how it applies in the eyes of the law. The question has to be what is the responsiblity of the school and that of the parents. Was the school wrong,probably, as it looks like that the school over reacted. The rules in most schools are there to protect the students and to try to prevent them from doing drugs. I do believe that the question must be asked, is this what they do with any and all students who were suspected and proven to be doing drugs in their school district? And under what guidelines do they use to determine if a child has been doing pot?
Well the question has to be what are the signs of such and what should be the correct action. In this case, they looked and the student probably looked different than he normally did, where his clothing were probably wrinkled, had a bit of a smell on him and red eyes, where he was probably neat, well dressed without the red eyes. All of them are the warning signs of substence abuse. However, I also believe that after talking with his mother, it should have been very apparent that the child was grieving and should have been given grief counsling and help from the district, to include pulling him from a few classes so that way the professionals there could listen and be a support mechanism for him.
Now the other question should be asked, what changes in the policies will be implimented to preventing this from happening again?

reply to post by Aggie Man


Of course he is going to get a lawyer and sue.
If he passed a drug test, regardless of the propriety of testing him in the first place... he can claim this suspension was an assassination of his character, damages his position and reputation in the school and in the community ...may even hurt his chances in the local job market, college acceptance and threaten his entire future.

Oh, I would look at this as an unfortunate happenstance BUT, a blessing in disguise. They should make the school board pay handsomely and think twice before doing it to someone else.

I would not accept the school boards apology - the damage has already been done.
People are going to label the kid a pothead even if the school takes out a full page ad in the local paper and the Principal begs his forgiveness.
A good lawyer could get a nice settlement with punitive damages.

Next time they will not go by "smell" and will accuse people only when they WITNESS someone smoking it and confiscate evidence that actually turns out to BE marijuana.

When I was in the 6th grade at Sunny Slope elementary in Omaha i was called into the office where a counselor was waiting for me. She wasn't a regular school counselor but one they brought in just for me. I have sinus problems and I have had them my whole life. It causes bags under my eyes and effects my sleep. The school thought I was on drugs and had this counselor question the heck out of me without my parents consent. I begged them to call my parents to confirm my sinus problems but they wouldn't. After an hour of questioning they took a break. I used the phone in the office and called my dad at work. It was a 30 minute drive from his work but he was there in 20. I had never seen my dad so angry in my life. I thought I was in trouble when he came storming in the office. To make a long story short what the school did was illegal and i got to go to a brand new school the next day.

This was about 30 years ago and people wern't as sue happy. But if something like this ever happens to my son you better believe they will be hearing from my lawer.

The school's administration spent hours on this case. Meanwhile, out back there was a foggy car filled with nug-huffing kids riding around with phish and grateful dead t-shirts on. The kid's dad was stabbed to death two days before, even if he was smoking some pot, cut him some slack. It sucks that about 75% of our public school educators are mindless twits, unable to get better jobs than the ones they have. While 25% COULD have better jobs, but they bust their ass trying to educate the youth of this nation. Meh, stupid case anyway.

reply to post by harrytuttle


When i was in 6th grade and the DARE program was in full swing, the teacher was given these incense type disks to burn to show us kids what pot smelled like so we could rat our parents , big siblings, friends, or neighbors out if we ever smelled this smell again.... but the thing is, we never could smell anything , so the teacher burned another and then another...... we never smelled anything in the classroom, but the rest of the building reeked like pot.


But I agree that the school was WAY outta line here. Stories like this make me want to hide my location.