Kansas City – A 12-year-old Overland Park girl was arrested and charged with a felony for forming a ‘gun’ with her fingers and pointing it at a few of her fellow classmates.
Police actually hauled the girl out of Westridge Middle School in handcuffs and charged the child with a felony; she is facing up to one year at a juvenile detention center.
Via The Kansas City Star:
A 12-year-old Overland Park girl formed a gun with her fingers, pointed at four of her Westridge Middle School classmates one at a time, and then turned the pretend weapon toward herself.
Police hauled her out of school in handcuffs, arrested her and charged the child with a felony for threatening.
But according to Johnson County District Court documents, on Sept. 18, the girl “unlawfully and feloniously communicated a threat to commit violence, with the intent to place another, in fear, or with the intent to cause the evacuation, lock down or disruption in regular, ongoing activities …” or created just the risk of causing such fear.
The Overland Park Police incident report provided to The Star included no details of what happened, only the date, time and place.
A person familiar with a more detailed incident report spoke to The Star on condition of anonymity. The person said that during a class discussion, another student asked the girl, if she could kill five people in the class, who would they be? In response, the girl allegedly pointed her finger pistol — like the ones many children use playing cops and robbers.
Because of that gesture, The Star was told, the girl was sent to Principal Jeremy McDonnell’s office, and the other students involved were also talked to. The school resource officer recommended that she be arrested, the source said. She was detained by police and later released to her mother. A hearing in the Juvenile Division of the District Court of Johnson County is set for Tuesday.
The girl’s grandfather told The Star that his granddaughter doesn’t even have access to a gun and had no intent to harm anyone.
“I think that this is something that probably could have been handled in the principal’s office and got completely out of hand,” Jon Cavanaugh, the girl’s grandfather in California, where the girl is now living, told The Star. “She was just mouthing off,” he said.
This 12-year-old girl isn’t the first child to be punished for making a gun with her fingers at school.
A 6-year-old boy in Colorado and 10 year-old boy in Ohio were both suspended for forming guns with their fingers.
Welcome to 2019 where children are arrested for forming ‘guns’ with their fingers while illegal aliens can rape and murder without fear of reprisal.
