I don't know what schooldesks look like these days. When I was in school, there was a sort of formica-looking desktop (only it was fake wood colored) and there were real wooden desks, which frequently left splinters in your hands, knees, legs and could ruin a good pair of pantyhose.
People would write in pencil on the formica topped desks (and the writing was easily removed with soap and water), while the wooden desks would be written on, or have initials carved in them with pen knives (back when real boys still carried pocket knives).
I don't remember if I ever wrote on either kind of desk. I was sort of a goody two-shoes, so I probably didn't. But did other kids? Of course. And sometimes they would get punished for doing it. Maybe the teacher would make them clean all the desks or send them to the principal's office for a couple of licks with the paddle he (for it was a he) kept for frequent offenders.
But arrested for writing on a school desk? I can't imagine that ever happening.
Well, it's happening now. Teachers and administrators have abdicated their responsibility to act in loco parentis, and so they are now forcing the police to do their disciplining for them.
In this day and age where young students are frequently charged for serious school offenses such as possessing weapons, dealing drugs, or assaulting other students on school property, one Brooklyn teen's arrest may come as a surprise. A 13-year-old girl was handcuffed and placed under arrest in front of her classmates in Dyker Heights after she wrote "Okay" on her desk.
The "suspect," Chelsea Fraser, says she's sorry for scribbling the word on her desk, but both she and her mother are shocked at the punishment...
Police confirm that that's exactly what's written on her arrest record and for the crime, she's been charged with criminal mischief and the making of graffiti. Fraser says the day she marked her desk, she was wrongly grouped together with troublemakers who had plastered stickers all over the classroom.
Fraser was arrested at the Dyker Heights Intermediate School on March 30 along with three other male students. She says she was made to empty her pockets and take off her belt. Then she was handcuffed and led out of the school in front of her classmates and placed in the back of a police car.
"It was really embarrassing because some of the kids, they talk, and they're going to label me as a bad kid. But I'm really not," Fraser said. "I didn't know writing 'Okay' would get me arrested."
"All the kids were ... watching these three boys and my daughter being marched out with four -- they had four police officers -- walking them out, handcuffed," Chelsea's mother Diana) Silva said. "She goes to me, 'Mommy, these hurt!'"
The students were taken to the 68th Precinct station house where Silva says they were separated for three hours. "MY child is 13-years-old -- doesn't it stand that I'm supposed to be present for any questioning?" Silva said. "I'm watching my daughter, she's handcuffed to the pole. I ask the officer has she been there the entire time? She says, 'Yes.'"
On her report card, under conduct, Fraser has earned all "satisfactory" marks and one "excellent" mark.
"My daughter just wrote something on a desk. I would have her scrub it with Soft Scrub on a Saturday morning when she should be out playing, and maybe a day of in-house and a formal apology to the principal," Silva said.
CBS 2 contacted both the NYPD and the Board of Education for a response. The police say the arrests followed a request by the school's principal. The Board of Education said the matter is under investigation, adding that graffiti was found on several desks.
I dunno. I still think making her clean all the desks in two or three classrooms, do community service--something--would be better than taking her to jail for graffiti. I realize the idea is to scare them into not wanting to repeat the experience, but what if this just desensitizes them to jail? And if you go to jail for writing on a schooldesk, what's the punishment for fighting or smoking in the boys' room?
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