DOCUMENT: K-12, Crime

Boy, 12, Busted Over Spilled Milk Incident

Student facing criminal raps over cafeteria beef

Spilled Milk

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Spilled Milk

APRIL 15--A 12-year-old boy was handcuffed and arrested by police when he scuffled with an officer after refusing to clean up spilled milk in the cafeteria of his Indiana middle school.

The student is facing a pair of misdemeanor resisting law enforcement counts, according to a Valparaiso Police Department report detailing the incident Tuesday morning at Ben Franklin Middle School.

The sixth grader, whose name was redacted from the report by police, got into a dispute with a school staffer when he refused to retrieve some napkins and clean up the spill during his lunch period. The boy, police reported, became “belligerent” and told the employee, “This is stupid, you’re retarded.”

After a school resource officer approached the student and asked him to clean up the milk, the boy said, “This is crap, I’m not doing it.” He then got up, emptied his tray into the trash, and began to leave the cafeteria. The officer instructed the boy to return to his seat and wait further instructions from the school administrator.

When the student became “increasingly agitated,” the officer grabbed the student by the arm and “began to perform an educational escort.” The boy then broke free, and ran around the cafeteria and a hallway before being tackled by the officer, who handcuffed the five-foot, 100-pound student.

The child was taken to the principal’s office, where he was later released into his father’s custody. (2 pages)

Comments (60)

Instead of sending him home, he should made him sit on the floor in the puddle of milk and used the seat of his pants to soak it up. I doubt he would talk back to any teacher or staff member after that.
I wonder if school would ever do that again after they got sued for million by student parents.
Isn't that what the "no speaka ingles" janitor is for? By the time he cleaned up the mess, lunch time is up. I would not have cleaned it up either.
yeah, but you're an adult who obviously chooses to treat others like dirt, who automatically thinks of people like janitors--who may have brown skin to boot--as their help. but maybe it's not too late for this kid to learn human decency and taking responsibility for your actions. that acting like a spoiled little twit makes you a spoiled little twit. i can't imagine what my parents would have done if I acted like this in school--man oh man,
What ever happened to personal responsibility?
A "school resource officer" had to perform an "educational escort" on a student who refused to listen to a staff member. Those terms sum up the problem with our schools today. Way back in the day when I was a kid, we either got swatted, sent to detention, or suspended if we didn't listen to teachers and staff members. And when we got home, we were often punished again by our parents for being a wise ass. There was no need for "resource officers" (whatever that is) or carefully worded terms like "educational escort" for when a teacher needed to get our attention. But back then, too, teachers didn't need to worry about getting sued by idiot parents who don't know how to raise their kids to respect their surroundings and their teachers.
I agree 100%. The way you worded that argument reminds me of something my own mother would say to me (she graduated high school in 1964). Things have changed quickly though. This year is my 10 year high school graduation anniversary, and even since then it's changed a lot. In my school 10 years ago that kid would've probably been tackled by one of our own hall monitors. The police were only ever called for bomb threats, weapons, or food fights that got so out of hand that people were going to the hospital: not because some stupid kid was being insubordinate. You'd think local law enforcement would insist to the school district that they have better things to do than discipline students for things that administrators and parents should be able to handle on a day-to-day basis. Our rapidly declining public and private school systems have gotten so unreasonably out of hand that it has become one of the main deciding factors for me not to ever bring a child into this world.
Go to the kid's parents and have them teach their kid to respect others. I'm sick of parents who allow it to happen. Nobody wants to take responsibility for their actions anymore. The parents are at fault though, they don't teach their kids how to behave like human beings.
Why the hell did he not taze the boy. That is SOP in these cases!
I'm sure they were thinking about it. Except they probably didn't want to hear a 12yr old hitting puberty scream... I sure as hell wouldn't...