Photo Credit: SHUTTERSTOCK
April 12, 2013 |
In Texas, hundreds of thousands of students are winding up in court for committing
very serious
offenses such as cursing or farting in class. Some of these so-called
dangerous criminals (also known as teenagers) will face arrest and even
incarceration, like the honors student who
spent a night in jail for skipping class, or the 12-year-old who was arrested for
spraying perfume on her neck.
These cases have at least one thing in common in that they were carried
out by special police officers walking a controversial beat: the
hallways and classrooms of public schools.
As political pressure
from both sides of the aisle mounts to increase police presence in
American schools, evidence suggests adding armed guards will only thrust
more disadvantaged youth into the criminal justice system. Civil rights
groups say policing our schools will further the institutionalization
of what's known as the "school-to-prison pipeline."
To understand
the potential consequences of putting police inside public schools, we
can take a look at Texas, where students face one of the most robust
school-to-prison pipelines in the country. According to the youth
advocacy group Texas Appleseed, school officers issued 300,000 criminal
citations to students in 2010, some handed to children as young as six
years old.
As the New York Times
notes,
Texas Appleseed and a local NAACP chapter filed a complaint in February
against a school district with a particular knack for criminalizing
children, especially minorities. The
complaint says
Bryan Independent School District of Texas’ Brazos County,
disproportionately ticketed black students for misdemeanors, potentially
violating the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Black students accounted for 46
percent of tickets issued in 2011 to 2012, despite only making up 21
percent of the student body.
Most of the criminal citations
levied against students were for “Class C” misdemeanors, compelling them
to miss classes in order to attend court, and often face addition
disciplinary action from the district. As the complaint notes, “These
students can then face sentences including fines, court costs, community
service, probation and mandatory participation in ‘First Offender’
programs.”
The complaint also adds that the problems often don’t
end there. If students fail to appear in court, or if their parents
can’t afford to pay fines, then the state issues an arrest warrant for
them when they turn 17. Thus, these tickets “can follow students past
high school into their adult lives with many of the same consequences as
a criminal conviction for a more serious offense, including having to
report their convictions on applications for college, the military or
employment.”
Advocacy groups add that many behavioral problems
warranting tickets in Texas schools seem to be rather trivial for
something that can lead to a criminal conviction. For example, some
“Class C” misdemeanors under the state’s penal code include using
profanity, making offensive gestures, creating “by chemical means” an
“unreasonable odor” and “making unreasonable noise in a public place” In
other words, yelling, farting, wearing Axe body spray and
generally being a teenager is officially illegal in Texas.
Many commentators and
several Democratic lawmakers scoffed
when NRA executive vice president Wayne LaPierre suggested in the wake
of the Newtown shooting that armed guards in schools is “the one thing
that would keep people safe,” notoriously adding that “the only thing
that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun.” Yet, not long
after LaPierre’s press conference, the White House
released a plan calling
for an additional 1,000 “specially trained police officers that work in
schools.” And just last week, an NRA task force released a report
fleshing out its proposal to put armed guards in every school. The head
of that task force, former GOP Congressman Asa Hutchinson, announced his
intentions to run for Arkansas Governor days after the report was
released.
"Obviously, we believe [armed guards] will make a
difference in the various layers that make up school safety," said Asa
Hutchinson in a news conference.
Several academics and judges
dispute Mr. Hutchinson’s claim, agreeing with Texas Appleseed’s reports
that police in schools turn them less into safe havens than juvenile
centers.
“There is no evidence that placing officers in the schools improves safety,” University of Maryland criminologist
Denise C. Gottfredson told the
Times.
“And it increases the number of minor behavior problems that are
referred to the police, pushing kids into the criminal system.”
Even Texas chief Supreme Court justice Wallace B. Jefferson
called out his state for
its role in the school-to-prison pipeline. "We are criminalizing our
children for nonviolent offenses," he said in a biennial address on the
state of the judiciary, referring to the 300,000 or so tickets issued to
students in Texas schools each year.
Steven Hsieh is an editorial assistant at AlterNet and writer based in Brooklyn. Follow him on Twitter
@stevenjhsieh.
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