City Defends Arresting Boy Over Stick Figure Drawing

Well in Florida the water makes them stoopid.

In Colorado, it makes them kill.

I don’t know anyone with ADHD that went to a therapist, is that normal treatment for someone with ADHD these days?

I’m leaning towards he has a juvenile record of assaulting someone or some kind of anger problems. I guess that would make his drawings more serious and also why the therapist told him to draw his feelings in an effort to get him to stop acting out those feelings.

Yeah, some kids with ADHD see Behavioral Therapists to get help in learning better ways to cope with issues. Not all kids are lucky enough to see one but it’s definitely done. One of my friends has a son with ADHD, she swears that his therapist was a God send. She chose to get him into see someone who would do more than just write out a prescription of meds to help him as most doctors tend to do and honestly it has worked wonders with him.

I am wondering why the teacher picked the drawing from the trash can and why the student didn’t save the drawing for his psychiatrist to review.

I cannot believe that a little boy is being denied an education no mater his needs. The fed mandates that special needs students must be accommodate either in the main stream or through special programming. I know this because the DC Department of Education (before and again after Michelle Reis left) is constantly defending itself not to have to comply and losing every f’ing single time in court.

I agree. I think the City is aware of past issues that they are not able to disclose for possible legal reasons, and this info was used — along with the drawing — to help them come to the decision they did.

Morbid, you are a talented (albeit creepy as fuck) artist. My doodles aren’t nearly as realistic.

ETA: Your artwork is creepy as fuck; you, however, rock.

Sounds a little suspicious… At least they admit it is/looks like an egregious act, but I guess it’s OK, because there’s a “back story” which, surprise!, only the police know about, therefore it can’t be analyzed or its existence even verified.

Assuming this is what it looks like, and the kid doesn’t have past incidents of excessive violence, incidents involving firearms, or or drawn what could be easily regarded as a “plan of violent action” (and then actually carrying it out), then this whole thing is crap, even if he is in Colorado. Doesn’t matter if it’s in California, Florida, Colorado or New York; this is bullshit.

Maybe arresting kids for violent stick figure drawings is what’s supposed to happen these days, and many schools/teachers just _don’t_ because it’s ridiculous, but I bet it’s more likely that this school/teacher is just overdoing it.

Final thought: What if the word “Teacher” in his little illustration had been changed to “Osama”? Or “Killers”? Or “Murderers” (In which case I’d be impressed if the 11-year old intended it to be a self-reflective pseudo-paradoxical thought experiment)? Hmmm…

These days I hardly think ADHD counts as ‘special needs’. It seems like most kids have it, probably because the inability to sit still and pay attention is kind of a defining trait for children. Today I would be diagnosed with ADHD, but I didn’t draw pictures of me killing my teachers as a child (and I had some pretty shitty teachers).

The fact that the kid is in regular therapy where he’s being told to draw when he’s angry instead of disrupting the class is kind of telling. His therapist wouldn’t have suggested that he re-direct his anger in that way unless he had already had anger issues. And he didn’t just draw it, he actually wrote “Teacher must die” on the paper! Would you want him in your child’s classroom after that?

Side note: I was in .. must have been first or second grade, when one day we had “Art Time” or something (not really “Art Class” at that age); just pretty much let the kids draw whatever. I ended up drawing “The Sea Of Blood,” which was … well a big ocean of blood with people screaming and trying to get out of it and stuff. My teacher asked what it was, and I cheerily replied “It’s the sea of blood. It’s where people go who are so bad that they’re too bad to even go to hell.”

I wasn’t raised religious, I was not a victim of abuse, I had not seen loads of real-life violence, and I was a happy, outgoing, A-grade student, never got into trouble, and to this day have been in one fight (where I was essentially a punching bag – there were 3 of them, give me a break!) I just have always liked and/or not been overly offended or overdramatic about spooky/evil stuff.

The response was…. (and this was in Florida back in .. must’ve been 84? 85? And no, I’m not a Floridian – even at that young age I remember thinking “The people here are nice but so many of them seem so stupid”) that my parents were told and it was suggested I see a therapist. After one or two visits, my father stopped sending me there due to “finding something out about the therapist which didn’t sit right, or his/her qualifications were shady, something that was just … off.” (he forgets the details since it was long ago and because _it wasn’t a big deal_).

Every time I read a story like this, I wonder what would happen if I had been born in today’s time and pulled the same stunt. Mind you, this was not for shock value, not for attention, and not me harboring some “plan” or whatever. It’s a fucking picture, get over it.

That’s all for now, my cellmate is coming back and he wants his shiv back. Oh, he’ll get it alright … (kidding! kidding!… I’m in solitary! Sheesh!)

http://www.trutv.com/library/crime/serial_killers/weird/kids1/index_1.html

When I was in tenth grade (EONS ago now), I had an absolute demon woman for an English teacher. She was mean, nasty, and emotionally/mentally abusive. Mybest friend and I would sit there and draw pictures of her with bullet holes in her or knives sticking out of her all the time. Fact was, she was a bitch, and we disliked her immensely. (For the record, I also drew the band teacher being squeezed to death by a giant cartoon mouse. I didn’t like him either.)

We of course felt HORRIBLE when, the next year, another student shot her in the face during class. She survived, FYI. Yeah, we didn’t like her much, but we certainly didn’t REALLY want her to be shot or stabbed. The point is, my friend and I were just blowing off steam. Yeah, it was morbid and certainly childish, but they were only DRAWINGS. While I know (having read this site for quite a long time now) that there are some deranged little shits out there, maybe this kid was just blowing off steam like we were doing back then. Arresting the kid is a little much, but he might need a psychiatric evaluation. Just sayin’.

I gotta agree with this.

Our initial reaction upon hearing of the arrest was that it was an unnecessarily extreme response. Sure, that was based on limited information, but… the police haven’t actually given us any more information at this point. Whatever they know that we don’t could very well justify everything, OR it could be just as insignificant as the stick-figure drawing.

The bottom line is, if we were suspicious before, we should remain suspicious until we get more actual evidence of anything. If they are justified, I’ll be relieved. But I’m not going to sit here and nod in agreement simply because the police came out and said, “No, really… take our word for it.”

“I understand the teacher’s want of caution, but I also think that she might have brought this to the attention of the school administrators before sounding the public alarm.”

I’m not sure (too lazy to RTFA), but it sounded to me like the teacher notified the administration, who brought in the police. I think it was the mother who brought the story to the media. And when she did so, she neglected to mention the “background” the school is talking about, which makes anything she says suspect, IMO (if she’s not telling the whole story, I would assume there is a reason for that). If she chooses to explain that background (as she can release the information, but the school can’t), then I would be less inclined to put her in the ‘parent of a precious snowflake’ category.

Everyone keeps mentioning that this was a stick-figure drawing, as if that makes the content harmless. If it were a well-drawn picture or an oil painting, would the fact that he wrote “Teacher must die” on it be less worrisome?

“I understand the teacher’s want of caution, but I also think that she might have brought this to the attention of the school administrators before sounding the public alarm.”

I’m not sure (too lazy to RTFA), but it sounded to me like the teacher notified the administration, who brought in the police. I think it was the mother who brought the story to the media. And when she did so, she neglected to mention the “background” the school is talking about, which makes anything she says suspect, IMO (if she’s not telling the whole story, I would assume there is a reason for that). If she chooses to explain that background (as she can release the information, but the school can’t), then I would be less inclined to put her in the ‘parent of a precious snowflake’ category.

Everyone keeps mentioning that this was a stick-figure drawing, as if that makes the content harmless. If it were a well-drawn picture or an oil painting, would the fact that he wrote “Teacher must die” on it be less worrisome?

“I understand the teacher’s want of caution, but I also think that she might have brought this to the attention of the school administrators before sounding the public alarm.”

I’m not sure (too lazy to RTFA), but it sounded to me like the teacher notified the administration, who brought in the police. I think it was the mother who brought the story to the media. And when she did so, she neglected to mention the “background” the school is talking about, which makes anything she says suspect, IMO (if she’s not telling the whole story, I would assume there is a reason for that). If she chooses to explain that background (as she can release the information, but the school can’t), then I would be less inclined to put her in the ‘parent of a precious snowflake’ category.

Everyone keeps mentioning that this was a stick-figure drawing, as if that makes the content harmless. If it were a well-drawn picture or an oil painting, would the fact that he wrote “Teacher must die” on it be less worrisome?

The February 22nd article stated:
He [the boy] was taken to the principal’s office where they determined he wasn’t a threat. His parents were notified and he was sent back to class. That seemed to be the end of it until Arvada Police showed up at the boy’s house later that day. His mother told her son to cooperate and just explained what happened, which he did. The police then charged him with a third degree misdemeanor, interfering with staff and students at an educational facility.

At that point the admin knew the background of the child and, though not conclusive, it sounds like the admin did not call the police, the boy’s mother didn’t call the police, and the boy himself did not call the police. Sounds like the teacher to me, but I could be wrong.

Every kid and every situation is different. In this case it was a kid drawing a violent picture which he was instructed to do. He was disruptive, but he was in compliance with his therapy.

There is either a lot of missing information or this is just another paranoid cluster fuck.

Or after school the teacher and/or administrators got together and determined that, based on this kid’s previous behavior, a death threat was something they needed to involve the police in.

And death threats, whether or not he had any intention of following through with them, do seem to constitute “interfering with staff and students at an educational facility”.

No this is Colo the victims paradise. this state refuses to question someones right to being a victim..

Yeah. It’s the _charge_ that is not only bullshit but makes the cops seem like idiots by choosing that charge. Perhaps I will look up the actual law, but how did he “interfere” with staff or students? From what it sounds like, he drew a picture, tossed it, and… that’s all he dis. If anything, the teacher interfered with staff/students, not the kid. Intention isn’t the same same as ..yknow, _doing_ something.

Good point. I wonder how long it took to find a law that might loosely fit the “crime.”