Freedom Of Speech Lives On For Atleast One More Da

The_Ancient · Jul 23, 2004

Court rules California student poem not criminal

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - A California teenager who frightened fellow high school students by showing them threatening poems he had written did not commit a crime, the California Supreme Court ruled Thursday.

Student George T., who signed his work Julius AKA Angel, shared poems with several female students in 2001 when he was 15 years old at a San Jose school.

"I am Dark, Destructive, & Dangerous," one of his poems read. "I slap on my face of happiness but inside I am evil!! For I can be the next kid to bring guns to kill students at school. So parents watch your children cuz I'm BACK!!"

After a student complained, police went to the teenager's home. When they asked if there were any weapons present, they were given a handgun and a rifle.

A juvenile court and a later appeals court found the student guilty of threatening two students, but the state Supreme Court overturned the ruling, saying the works constituted creative expression protected in the First Amendment.

"We conclude that the ambiguous nature of the poem, along with the circumstances surrounding its dissemination, fail to establish that the poem constituted a criminal threat," the state's highest court wrote.

In its decision the court reprinted two of the poems, complete with spelling errors, and provided an unusual literary review.

"These lines convey the protagonist's feelings about the students around him and describe his envy over how happy and intelligent they appear to be, with opportunities he does not have," Justice Carlos Moreno wrote at one point in analyzing the lines of poetry.

"Of course, exactly what the poem means is open to varying interpretations because a poem may mean different things to different readers. As a medium of expression, a poem is inherently ambiguous."

The court wrote that U.S. school shootings in recent years had heightened security concerns but still backed the student's right to engage in creative expression.
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I just can not believe it had to go all the way to the Supreme Court, it should have never been a case to begin with...

This is all nuts

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