Hate Crime Alleged at Seattle Elementary School

Discussion in 'Ethics, Morality, & Justice' started by Tiassa, Apr 14, 2010.

  1. Tiassa Let us not launch the boat ... Valued Senior Member

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    37,882
    Because, you know, kids will be kids. Right?

    Police are investigating a possible bias crime in which a student at Madrona K-8 School was allegedly choked with a plastic bag over his head after the suspected attacker said "I hate Mexicans."

    The incident was reported the following day, April 7, after the victim's parents told school staff about the assault. Interviews with school staff led police to determine there may be three other victims of a similar attack, according to an incident report released Tuesday.

    The victim whose parents contacted the school was near his locker about 12:15 p.m. when he heard the derogatory statement from behind him, according to police. He then reported feeling the black plastic shopping bag pulled over his head.

    The boy "reached with his hands to remove the bag as it simultaneously pulled tight (from behind) against his mouth, nose and face," Officer Steven Bale wrote in his report. "(The victim) said he could not breathe and attempted to scream but could not due to lack of air.

    "He struggled for several seconds to remove the bag and estimated the time to be approx13 (sic) seconds. (The victim) indicated he was feeling weak, scared, and unable to breathe and could not remove the bag as it was covering his face."

    The student turned and faced the alleged assailant. His alleged attacker did not make any statements, "but continuously laughed," according to Bale's report.

    The victim told investigators that he wanted to punch the student, but walked to a classroom instead. According to incident report, as the victim was leaving, the alleged attacker said "I'm sorry. I'm just play'en. It was a joke."


    (McNerthney)

    I mean, I know comedy gets stale periodically, but I'm hard pressed to figure how trying to kill someone—or make someone believe they are about to die—is just playing.

    Presently, the school has not stated what punishment the alleged attacker faces, though Seattle Public Schools spokeswoman Patti Spencer said, "The appropriate level of discipline has been taken for the student involved." The Seattle Police Department continues its investigation; no arrests have been made, and the case has not, at this time, been referred to the King County Prosecutor.

    The school, in Seattle's Madrona neighborhood, had 452 students enrolled as of last fall. As the neighborhood gentrifies, it has faced a growing outcry from parents about a broad range of problems, including racial and ethnic tensions. The 2008-09 school year saw 13.6% of its student body—56 students—suspended for disciplinary reasons, which is more than twice the average for public schools in Seattle (6.4%).

    In 2007, The Seattle Times reported on racial and class issues challenging Madrona K-8, noting that the student body was 75% black, 11% white, and the remainder divided among other races and ethnicities. In recent years, some parents have gone so far as to withdraw their children from the school, saying the community's efforts to help the educational process at Madrona K-8 have been consistently rejected or ignored. Some white parents have accused the school of deliberately tanking a white student's reading skills assessment in a plot to keep the student body predominantly black. School principal Kaaren Andrews, in 2007, recounted a story of white parents asking her why she was "still trying with those children", referring to two black students who had just been in a fight.

    How the current allegations fit into the sad tale of Madrona K-8 remains to be seen, but it well may be that apparent racial tensions are simply reflections of class differences. Ed Taylor, a dean at the University of Washington, explained in 2007, "Here, you have an interesting confluence where kids living in Section 8 housing are brought together with what might be the children of Microsoft millionaires. There are fundamental questions for that neighborhood: Can you thoughtfully have a multiracial school in which the needs of all kids are being met?"

    It would seem Madrona has a long way to go. Still, one wonders what family or community values might lend to one student attempting to suffocate another, as a joke, for the fact of being of Hispanic descent.
    ____________________

    Notes:

    McNerthney, Casey. "Police investigating report of hate crime at Seattle school". April 13, 2010. SeattlePI.com. April 14, 2010. http://www.seattlepi.com/local/418393_crime14.html

    Turnbull, Lornet. "Race, class splinter Madrona School". The Seattle Times. March 28, 2007. SeattleTimes.NWSource.com. April 14, 2010. http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2003639256_madrona28m.html
     
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  3. Cowboy My Aim Is True Valued Senior Member

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    I not an expert on law, but it seems that this would be "assault with a deadly weapon" at the very least, if not attempted murder.

    If this really was the attacker's idea of a joke, then he or she is a wacko and should be removed from the school and sent to an institution for being a danger to others.
     
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  5. Tiassa Let us not launch the boat ... Valued Senior Member

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    Serial hate?

    I would also note that where McNerthney suggested three other similar assaults, the Seattle Times suggests four: "Police are looking into four other incidents in which students said they had bags placed over their heads by the same boy that day at school, said police spokesman Mark Jamieson" (Sullivan).

    • • •​

    They might be able to muster charges of Assault in the Second Degree according to Washington statutes. This was at an elementary school, though, so it is unlikely the suspect will be charged as an adult.

    Good faith prevents prosecutors from filing charges as a matter of demonstration insofar as I think it would be worthwhile to haul this kid into court, charge him with something the People cannot win a conviction on—e.g., attempted murder—and thereby scare the holy bejeezus out of him while forcing an expensive criminal defense that his parents might take out of his hide.

    But that's not the way things should be done, so he'll probably face something like a year in a juvenile correction facility, and come out hating hispanics even more.
    ____________________

    Notes:

    Sullivan, Jennifer. "Madrona student accused in race-related assault". The Seattle Times. April 14, 2010. SeattleTimes.NWSource.com. April 16, 2010. http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/theblotter/2011607904_youth_accused_of_suffocating_a.html

    "RCW 9A.36.021". Revised Code of Washington. (n.d.) Apps.Leg.WA.gov. April 16, 2010. http://apps.leg.wa.gov/RCW/default.aspx?cite=9A.36.021
     
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  7. Cowboy My Aim Is True Valued Senior Member

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    Do you think it would be impossible to get this weirdo convicted of attempted murder? There is little good that can come of holding a plastic bag over someone's head, after all. And in a K-8 school, he could be as old as 14. I'd imagine that most 14 year olds understand the concept of death and the dangers of suffocation.

    Could they at least get the kid kicked out of local schools? Especially considering that he may turn out to be a multiple-time offender?
     
  8. Tiassa Let us not launch the boat ... Valued Senior Member

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    37,882
    Not impossible, but neither is it likely

    It's an odd statute in Washington. To the one, yes, you can convict someone of attempted murder when murder was not their intent. To the other, if it is true that this is a serial assault, one can point to the fact that the other victims were voluntarily left alive by the assailant as a defense against attempted murder. The question is whether a jury will be pragmatic or anxious. A pragmatic jury would likely acquit an attempted murder charge. An anxious jury would show a greater disposition toward conviction.

    I think even at fourteen, if the suspect is tried as an adult, a jury's sympathies could be played against conviction because of what the child would face in prison. To the other, "I hate Mexicans", the plastic bag, and the odd apology ("I'm just playin'") suggests a younger suspect. And as that age goes down, the less likely the suspect will be tried in a regular court.

    If prosecutors take it to juvenile court, they should simply go for what they can get, which would likely be Assault 2, which is rated B+ in the sentencing standards. As near as I can tell, for the first conviction, the juvenile suspect would face 15-36 weeks in a youth correctional facility. If the juvenile suspect is convicted for all four alleged incidents, he appears to face two years in the hall, according to RCW 13.40.180.

    As yet, the school is tight-lipped about what disciplinary measures they have effected against the suspect, except to say that they have applied an appropriate level of discipline. We can only guess, at this point, what that means.
    ____________________

    Statutes Cited (RCW):

    Criminal attempt: 9A.28.020

    Assault in the second degree: 9A.36.021

    Juvenile offender sentencing standards: 13.40.0357

    Disposition order — Consecutive terms when two or more offenses — Limitations: 13.40.180

    Revised Code of Washington. December 10, 2009. Apps.Leg.WA.gov. April 18, 2010. http://apps.leg.wa.gov/Rcw/default.aspx
     
  9. soccer_boy Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    2
    You'd think so, but kids do crazy things. When I was in high school the cross country team hazed by doing this -- it was called "bagging". Basically they just tied your hands and put a garbage bag over your head until you were pleading for mercy. Crazy stuff happens out there.
     
  10. mordea Registered Senior Member

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    418
    Strange, I thought hazing was common in America.
     
  11. Tiassa Let us not launch the boat ... Valued Senior Member

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    37,882
    Don't waste our time

    There is no indication that this alleged assailant's pattern was part of any hazing ritual. Silly me, I figured you could tell the difference. Or is this one of those things where you'll say anything as long as it either empowers hatred or brings your need for self-victimization the gratification of yet another pointless fight in which your stupid arguments are savaged six ways from Sunday and you get to whine and cry about how evwybody's bein' mean at you?
     
  12. nirakar ( i ^ i ) Registered Senior Member

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    3,383
    Kids get away with a lot of bullying activity that would be considered criminal if done by adults.

    Kids vent their frustration from the violence in their families on other kids. I think children instinctually practice pecking order establishing behavior designed to enhance their status in a chimpanzee-man like tribe which is no longer the way humans live. Culturally modern society outlaws the sort of behavior that Jane Goodall observed in chimpanzees but I think human instinct is optimized for living in a society that more closely resembles Goodalls chimpanzees than it resembles Seattle in 2010.

    In Seattle 2010 culture the Bill Gates types rise to the top but if you put a little Bill Gates types child in the Madrona k-8 school he probably would routinely get suffocated with bags or whatever torture the kids think up that day and probably never grows up to reach his Bill Gates potential. Meanwhile the kids who develop the skills and habits useful for rising to the top of Madrona k-8's pecking order will probably be completely unprepared to compete in the adult Seattle world where Bill Style skills and habits raise person too the top of the pecking order.

    The racial stuff is secondary. In the world of Jane Goodall's chimpanzees it is appropriate to commit genocide on the neighboring tribe if your tribe can accomplish this without hurting itself. The instincts for this genocidal chimpanzee behavior have been modified in humans but I think they still exist in us and they still call us towards genocide and can be activated whenever they receive cultural support.

    In this modern world everything is confusing and nothing is like the world that our instincts evolved to push us to excel in. Culture is a fast instinct overlay on our basic instincts. This special human feature called culture allows us to make quick temporary modifications of our instincts without using the very slow and more permanent process of modifying our DNA. Science studies on babies seem to show that we have some instincts about race but these instincts don't seem very strong and can be taken out of play culturally.

    Culture reminds me of supreme court justice decisions. They want to rule however they feel like ruling emotionally and then use all of their legal training to see if they can come up with a semi-plausible legal argument for ruling how they feel like ruling emotionally. If they can't come up with a semi -plausible legal argument for ruling how they want to rule they overrule their own emotions and follow the law. With race we have people making cultural arguments for and against singling out people racially for special positive or negative treatment based on race. This war of battling sets of cliches determines whether or not people will give themselves permission to follow their own instincts and conditionings and to whom and to what degree those instincts and conditionings will be applied.

    Does some presumably black child really know if he is racist against Mexicans? Does white hate radio filter down to and affect the target choices of angry black kids looking for a reason to hurt somebody because they have been hurt and because they want to climb the pecking order? We live in a mental mish mosh. None of us really know what we are doing or why we believe the thing that we pretend so deeply to believe that we even fool ourselves. So a bunch of physical twitches and cliches and emotions end up looking like some kid is racist against Mexicans.

    Borrowing from Forrest Gump, Racism is as Racism does so I guess there was a hate crime in a Seattle school.
     
    Last edited: May 9, 2010
  13. mordea Registered Senior Member

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    418
    I never said it was. Perhaps you need to focus less on typing pages of crap, and more on your reading comprehension.
     
  14. Tiassa Let us not launch the boat ... Valued Senior Member

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    37,882
    The obvious

    Then what, pray tell, was your point in #7 above?

    "Strange, I thought hazing was common in America."​

    I mean, I'll be happy to strike that post as off topic, if you prefer.

    Or maybe I should simply stop giving you such credit as to presume you're even attempting to post something relevant in any given discussion.
     
  15. mordea Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    418
    "I'm hard pressed to figure how trying to kill someone—or make someone believe they are about to die—is just playing. "

    Hazing tends to involve making someone believe that they are about to die, or at least put them through some very dangerous trials. All in the spirit of fun.

    Ergo. It is possible to make someone believe that they are about to die while playing.
     
  16. Tiassa Let us not launch the boat ... Valued Senior Member

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    37,882
    Rites of passage are not play. Oh, and there is no rite of passage evident here.

    So, let me get this straight. You're arguing that:

    • You "thought hazing was common in America".

    • Hazing is one way in which "it is possible to make someone believe that they are about to die while playing".

    • But your response to the proposition that there is no indicaiton of a hazing ritual is that you "never said" this incident was hazing?​

    Why, then, introduce such an irrelevant argument? Oh, right, because you like these tiffs between people. Makes you feel simultaneously persecuted and empowered.

    How about this, Mordea: Why don't you stop wasting our time?

    Rites of passage, Mordea, are not play. There may be some playful aspect about them—e.g., snipe hunts—but they are not, in and of themselves, play.

    An extract summary of Mircea Eliade's The Sacred and the Profane:

    Initiation now comes to occupy Eliade's attention. Regarding his primitive cultures, he distinguishes between age group initiations, in which everybody had to take part, and secret society initiations, which had restricted admission. He also emphasises the role of initiation in informing religious consciousness.

    The phenomenon of initiation reveals archaic man's religious idealism. It shows that he felt a need to rise above his natural self, by imitating the initiation rites of the gods, heroes or ancestors described in his mythology.

    Typically, archaic initiation rites imparted three kinds of revelation: about the sacred, about death and about sexuality. They meant subjecting initiates to some kind of symbolic death, followed by rebirth as a new person. Eliade refers very briefly to various examples of both puberty and secret society initiation rites, revealing that at the level of detail the symbolism varied from culture to culture ....

    .... A general conclusion that Eliade draws is that the association of death in rites of passage with initiation into a sacred level of existence meant that, for his primitive religious man, death was always an initiation of that kind.

    Eliade finds the same sort of symbolic structure in his 'higher' religions. One way or another, in Indian religions and in Christianity, a mystic's access to the sacred was a matter of death to profane life, follow by rebirth.


    (Durham)

    Additionally, rites of passage—e.g., hazing—are more organized than a single assailant voicing his hatred of Mexicans and attempting to kill someone or cause them to believe they are dying.

    Hell, wouldn't that be a convenient excuse for waterboarding? "We were just playing. You know, hazing the prisoners."

    I don't disdain Soccer Boy's input on the issue, but there is no aspect of hazing, initiation, or passage about these alleged assaults. And that's what they appear to be: serial assaults.

    Judging by the context of Cowboy's comment and the response, if Soccer Boy was attempting to justify the alleged assaults as hazing, he would have said so more directly, instead of simply pointing out that "kids do crazy things".
    ____________________

    Notes:

    Durham, Jack. "Mircea Eliade: The Sacred & The Profane 3 Sacred Nature (Summary)". 2003. ByTrent.Demon.co.uk. May 10, 2010. http://www.bytrent.demon.co.uk/eliadesp04.html
     
  17. soccer_boy Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    2
    Tiassa is correct. I wasn't saying that what happened in the Seattle school was hazing.

    The hazing I experienced was a formalized ritual -- and definitely wasn't a game.
     

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