They Are Crazy in Florida!

My eighth installment of "They Are Crazy in Florida!"

February 23, 2005

Florida boy accused of assault with rubber band

13-year-old suspended 10 days after confrontation with teacher

WKMG Local 6


Suspended from school. Robert Gomez has been accused of threatening a teacher with a rubber band. WKMG Local 6 image.

A 13-year-old student in Orange County, Fla., was suspended for 10 days and could be banned from school over an alleged assault with a rubber band, according to a WKMG Local 6 News report.

Robert Gomez, a seventh-grader at Liberty Middle School, said he picked up a rubber band at school and slipped it on his wrist.

Gomez said when his science teacher demanded the rubber band, the student said he tossed it on her desk.

After the incident, Gomez received a 10-day suspension for threatening his teacher with what administrators say was a weapon, Local 6 News reported.

"They said if he would have aimed it a little more and he would have gotten it closer to her face he would have hit her in the eye," mother Jenette Rojas said.

Rojas said she was shocked to learn that her son was being punished for a Level 4 offense -- the highest Level at the school. Other violations that also receive level 4 punishment include arson, assault and battery, bomb threats and explosives, according to the Code of Student Conduct.

Level 4 offense eh? Tossing rubberbands, sharpening pencils, making the shape of a gun with your hand, beating the crap out of the people around you with hard backed text books or desks, talking trash during Thug Ball at PE, tripping and falling, giving your buddy's a high-five?

The district said a Level 4 offense includes the use of any object or instrument used to make a threat or inflict harm, including a rubber band.

Rojas plans to fight the ruling but her son still faces expulsion.

"It's ridiculous, it's a rubber band," Rojas said.

The school's principal could not comment because the case is still under investigation.

A district spokesman said there is still a series of meetings the district will have before Gomez is officially expelled.

This is way beyond common sense to me. I don't get it. What does this solve? I guess if you want the kids living in fear of being expelled because a shoe came untied, you've got it.