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Texas cops arrest 11-year-old honors student and put him in solitary confinement for three days
(www.texasobserver.org)
this post was submitted on 04 Nov 2023
689 points (98.6% liked)
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99.9999% of police brutality, corruption, and misconduct is never investigated, never punished, never makes the news, so it's not on this page.
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The legal doctrine of "qualified immunity" renders police officers invulnerable to lawsuits for almost anything they do. In practice, getting past 'qualified immunity' is so unlikely, it makes headlines when it happens.
All this is a path to a police state.
In a free society, police must always be under serious and skeptical public oversight, with non-cops and non-cronies in charge, issuing genuine punishment when warranted.
Police who break the law must be prosecuted like anyone else, promptly fired if guilty, and barred from ever working in law-enforcement again.
That's the solution.
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All this punishment on a smart kid who simply wanted to have a school councilor to talk to after he had lost his father to cancer.
This shitty principal should be fired and also investigated for false reporting. I'd be really interested to hear which student reported this boy for uttering a threat to kill the principal because it sounds more like the principal made this up to toss a kid in solitary confinement for a weekend to shut him up.
The thing that sucks is, no 11 year old should be arrested unless they're actively threatening physical harm with a weapon, and three days in solitary on top is just beyond the pale. It sucks that we have to have "perfect" victims before the powers that be dare to take notice, and even then it's not enough.
So many children let down by this system, who knows how many stories we haven't heard. And not a god damn thing changes.
He should be fucking arrested. He ruined that boy's life. He'll never be the same after three days in solitary for asking for mental help.
The principal is a woman. She should be fired but the real issue is how the police handled it. Instead of arresting a 5th grader they could have told the principal to kick rocks and that they would investigate the threat. Which was literally hearsay and after investigation they'd have found nothing.
Turning off body cam to bully a child....sounds exactly like what a bastard would do.
I feel so bad for that child. His father died less than a year ago and he was kept in solitary confinement for 3 days. I hope he and his mother find a good lawyer that gets true justice for him. And I hope the people of Brownsville stand up for justice and get the principal fired. I hope they pressure the police to change policy on no longer allowing body cams to be turned off. And I hope the arresting officer dies sad, miserable, alone, and soon.
That's.....
I mean, this shit principal and the cops that put handcuffs on an 11 year old boy should be prosecuted to the full extent of the law.
But saying he'll NEVER be the same again after three days in solitary, and the boy's life is ruined is too much of a stretch. A little dramatic
People are resilient, especially kids.
Not even close to a stretch. This study is with adults, and not with an already fragile child dealing with trauma.
https://www.nami.org/Blogs/NAMI-Blog/March-2023/How-Solitary-Confinement-Contributes-to-the-Mental-Health-Crisis#:~:text=Among%20many%20other%20mental%20health,of%20an%20acute%20mental%20illness.
|Mental Illness And Solitary Confinement
Those with mental illness are overrepresented in solitary confinement, despite the vulnerability and threats to the mental health of those incarcerated. Research shows that the effects of solitary confinement on mental health are often fatal, both during and after incarceration. Half of all suicides in prisons and jails occur in solitary confinement. A recent study shows the long-lasting effects; that any amount of time spent in solitary increases the risk of death in the first year after release.
Individuals were overall 24% more likely to die in the first year after release, including from suicide (78% more likely) and homicide (54% more likely). They were also 127% more likely to die of an opioid overdose in the first two weeks after release.
Among many other mental health experts, Dr. Stuart Grassian, a psychiatrist, observed the devastating mental health consequences of the practice. Solitary confinement, he found, caused either (1) the exacerbation or recurrence of preexisting mental health issues, or (2) the onset of an acute mental illness. He is also credited for identifying a specific psychiatric syndrome associated with solitary confinement, termed the SHU Syndrome.
Well TIL
Yeah it's pretty fucked honestly, a lot of people that have never been to jail or prison don't really have the perspective how just how horrible it is. Time moves differently in there and your sense of control you have with autonomous movement is gone. 1 week in jail goes by quite a bit slower than 1 week in regular life. Add solitary to it and it's a straight up nightmare.
Yup and my comment was more as to hoping the kid wouldn't suffer permanent damages but clearly that's not the case. I didn't know the stats
he’ll never trust authority the same again
probably for the best
This was a school shooting threat in the county next to Uvalde. This needs to be 100% researched and investigated.
No. This was a principal punishing a child for being difficult by making up threats. Nobody even mentioned shooting except you.
Not even difficult, he was just interested in using the mental health faculty that was provided the year before to continue to work through his father's death. She could easily have explained to the kid or his parent that the councilor would not be replaced. Going after the kid with selective enforcement of uniform rules while ignoring others was blatant punishment and the escalation to calling the police is excessive force. If this kid were black there is even a higher than normal chance the cops would have hurt him by treating him like an adult.
Absolutely! Should have been clearer that I meant him being difficult from the perspective of the principal, not from that of myself or anyone else with any empathy and common sense.
Yes. that is exactly what I said. The full source of the threat reported needs to be examined. If the principle is found to be the origin he needs to go to prison.
Go home, child abuse apologist, you're drunk.
Do you think that being in close proximity to a school shooting increases the risk of a school shooting?
TIL school shootings are contagious
The fucked up thing is, that they are, but not the way the OC implies. 24h news cycles and heavy exposure to reports glorifying shooters do act as triggers for other potential shooters. The same is true for suicide and serial killers.