I realize this questions answers itself, but I’m continuously amazed at the bone-headed decisions made by politicians and bureaucrats.
Indeed, I wish I had this example for my recent post comparing incompetent officials in the United States with their counterparts in the United Kingdom.
A kid in Indiana played a prank involving a blow-up doll in the women’s bathroom at his high school. Sounds like a couple of afternoons of detention, right? Think again. Here’s an excerpt from a local news report.
A Rushville High School senior faces a felony charge after bringing a blow-up doll to school as part of what he claims was a prank. School officials called police May 31 after a package was found in a girls’ bathroom. A deflated blow-up doll was later found inside the box. Tyell Morton, 18, was arrested on a preliminary charge of felony criminal mischief after he admitted to bringing the doll to school. …The family’s attorney, Robert Turner, said the charge is excessive. “It’s interesting that had he gone to school with a gun, there would’ve been a lesser charge. It would’ve been a Class D felony with up to three years,” he said.
I’m glad I went to school before this type of nonsense became commonplace, because I was once an immature punk (most people would say I’m now an immature grownup, but that’s a separate issue). Not that I’m admitting anything, because I have no idea what the statute of limitations is on these matters, but I may have once set off a string of 400 firecrackers in a school stairwell. And I may have once let a snake loose in the school library.
Back then, I might have gotten suspended for a couple of days if I had been caught. Today, I’d be at Gitmo. Okay, that might be an exaggeration, but you know what I mean.
Why, as your mother, was I not informed about these events? Were you not caught? Ah, where did I go wrong . . .
Well, you have to worry about the blow up doll exploding if one gets carried away–if you know what I mean.
I guess you got caught Dan!!
400 “explosive devices”?? In a facility for CHILDREN??? You could be serving 400 life sentences!!!!
Obviously, we see the Peter Principle at work here. Our government is a magnificent example of this astute principle. In case you never read the book, the Peter Principle may be summarized as follows: “The theory that employees within an organization will advance to their highest level of competence and then be promoted to and remain at a level at which they are incompetent.” … “In a hierarchically structured administration, people tend to be promoted up to their level of incompetence,” Now, if we could just invent a way to siphon off those at the top…
I can see it now… Civil War re-enactors will have to re-enact their Civil War battles with pictures of guns and pictures of explosions, for their safety of course.
I was left wondering what kind of a sentence might he get now, as compared to the “up to three years”.
Very funny “sordid past” story ! Terrifying to see a boy go to jail for doing no harm!. From my “sordid past”: When we were 13-14 year old kids here in Latin America we used to fondle curvaceous women’s rear ends -without their consent, of course- on the streets, on buses, etc. The worst thing that could happen to us was a big slap in the face or a woman angrily shouting at us in public (I wonder how it never happened). It is obvious that fondling women without their consent should not be done, but there must be limits to the punishment: One of the many horror stories from the USA that I know is about a rich man that had to pay $1 million dollars because he fondled a woman’s rear end WHILE DRUNK!
Sorry for commenting so much, but I wonder how you can enjoy life there in the USA if you can go to jail for the slightest offenses. Probably you live in a perpetual paranoid state. Lifetime for stealing steaks as a third offense is a very very cruel and unusual punishment but it happened in California!
Here some people tried to go along the US cruel path of colossal punishments for ridiculously small offenses but the judges never went along, we have here a compassionate culture that never allows such behavior. Many Latin Americans still emigrate to the USA because we still have so many poor places with very little capital. But as more capital accumulates here and we get better wages that flow will stop if the USA continues this tyrannical cruel punishment path.
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[…] I semi-confessed that I may have set off fireworks in a stairwell at my high school. […]