David Alberts says:
I can't Believe what I am reading about Greenwich.
As a former public school administrator with the Greenwich Public Schools, I am both saddened and horrified that the EXCELLENT standards that were once the trumpeted hallmark of excellence that all of the public schools presented to the world have been so badly compromised by ALL OF THE "ADULTS" involved in this situation.
The Adults committed the crime here by even allowing the student/staff/administration/ school board/parent rapport to be so badly compromised that a moment like this could be handled so inappropriately. Whomever agreed to tasers on campus, for any reason at all, is the first criminal to be held responsible. The user of the taser obviously did not know about or care to investigate the student's health history. Applying this use of force could have resulted in the death of a student.
I cannot believe this "scene" is representative of the Greenwich community. I had a number of standards as an administrator that were never to be compromised. Two of these come to mind immediately upon reading this....
#1 NEVER DISCIPLINE, INTENTIONALLY EMBARASS OR DERIDE A STUDENT IN ANY WAY IN FRONT OF ANY OTHERS......THIS IS A VERY PRIVATE TIME !!!
#2 ALWAYS LET THE STUDENT KNOW THAT YOU CAN HELP HIM/HER WITH WHATEVER THE PROBLEM IS. I would simply lean over, nearing an ear of the student, and whisper "please come with me........we can talk this over PRIVATELY !!!
Works every time. The staff, administrators, school board members, parents....and especially the "School Resource Officers" [what a silly acronym] need to change course, try "genuinely caring about each and every student" and letting them know that you will never give up on any of them for any reason. Put your tasers back in the hands of the evil minds that invented and sell these weapons. Otherwise, what's next?
David Alberts, former principal of Hamilton Avenue School, summer term principal at the high school for two years, and a teacher/teacher-leader at North Street & Julian Curtis elementaries.
Backwards State says..
Tasering a student strikes me as harsh,especially for a student who was suspended for thowing a WATER BALLOON, hello, a water balloon!) but things have gotten so out of control in all of the schools in Fairfield County that a few over reactions by authority figures may give the message to all students that it is time to follow the rules and do what they're supposed to do -- learn something and get an education.
A Greenwich Guy says:
Good job P.O. Franco.
He was tasered because he was being placed under arrest and didn't comply with the commands of the officer. If he complied as the law states then there would have been no problem and he could have had his day in court.
Old Greenwich says:
Tasering students is wrong. Tasers should not be allowed on school grounds. The tasering in this case is a complete abuse of power. The school administrators and Betty Sternberg should remove the school resource officers from the school, permanently. Alan Capasso needs to rethink his diciplinary approach. Suspending students for minor pranks is excessive. This whole incident is a shameful example of how our children are being treated in the school system.
Mr-C says:
If the teen couldn't co-operate and was confrontational then he deserved to be tasered. As a 4th generation Greenwichite..........this isn't Greenwich the way it used to be. Everyone is demanding and confrontational and feels they are owed. Well the police are owed too and what they did was use reasonable force on someone who refused to obey the rules.
Nate says:
This is yet another example of excessive force used on (minority and male) adolescents for doing nothing more than exhibiting adolescent behavior. You should see the "senior pranks" in other countries' high schools as an example. Throwing water balloons should be overlooked. But even if the kids are stopped, no police should be involved. Administrators and teachers can handle this.
I want to know says:
What does Judge Judy think? Would she be happy if her Grandson got zapped. From now on we should just implant a node in every high schooler. When they act up with water balloons or break "the LAW" they can be made to submit with a push of the button.
Amazing you have the cops on a call to confront a mental patient and they choose not to taser. Cop in hospital with brain injuries. Confront a high school shrimp sized punk and give him the zap.
Poor training and poor canidates for the job make for injured cops and lawsuits we as taxpayers will bear.
Police work for DUMMIES is available at Borders.
Ma in CT says:
Wow, water balloons- wonder what the principal would have done if he put a volkswagon beetle in the student center?????
Inside Man says:
Well, first of all he just finished getting suspended, and was leaving the school after the punishment was made, until the cops started hassling him telling him to go to the administrators office when he just wanted to leave the school in general. For 3 cops and security there too, they still needed to taser him?? does that sound right to you?? and it wasn't just a minor 1 second taser they did it more than it was said on the paper.
totally indefensible says:
What the kid did was not criminal. But a narrow-minded cop treated an angry kid is if he was a criminal. He used a weapon, yes, a weapon, on that kid that has resulted in the deaths of many people. Tasers can kill you, and there is plenty of data suggesting that it does. What would you be saying if the kid had suffered a heart attack and died? Would you still call this kid, whose run-in was precipitated by nothing more than engaging in a senior day prank, a criminal? Would you say that his death was justified?
The cop walked up to him, stuck his taser in the kid's chest and fired three electric shocks into his body. Is that the way our kids are supposed to be treated? Is that the way Greenwich High School is supposed to deal with kids who get angry? Should every kid having a bad day who kicks a chair be subjected to electric shocks?
The school and the police should be ashamed of themselves. That school is one of the safest in the country. Yet a perverse mentality has taken hold that treats it and its students as dangerous potential criminals who need to be controlled.
It appears that the police treat the town's youth as though they think they've got it coming to them because they've been sheltered. It's precisely that chip on their collective shoulder about which the youth in this town have been complaining for years. And it is precisely that bad relationship that was the motivating for bringing in the police officer in the first place: to "improve the relationship between the town's youth and the police." Well, that strategy lies in tatters now.
think again says:
Perhaps the fact that he wanted to return to school should have been taken into account by the headmaster. What on earth was he thinking to suspend that kid for an entire week for nothing more serious than throwing a water balloon?
It is precisely because there is a police officer stationed there that so many behavioral problems are not treated as they should be: as immature students who can be emotional and who deserve to be treated with compassion and understanding by adult educators and administrators, but as violations of the law which are treated with the harshest measures, including arrest and prosecution.
He threw a water balloon! It is very clearly the school administration that is out of control here. There should be a hearing about this and about whether or not the police should continue to be stationed at Greenwich High School.
I was there says:
What the newspapers don't say is that he didn't leave the school and come back, they just finished telling him he was suspended, and he came out into the student center to say goodbye to his friends and make plans for later that afternoon, when security and an officer came to make sure he left that second and when he was going to leave the premises they then told him that he had to wait for his parents, he's 18 years old, he should've been able to left when he wanted to.
former stamford resident says:
I`m willing to bet that if this kid wasn't a minority things would have been done differently.Lets say if his name was Jones or Smith or some other blueblood name. After all the cops wouldn`t want to make waves with the people that have a lot of say in the community. Look at the mess they made of the Moxley case way back when. A Kennedy relative was involved in that one. I guess they had more pull than that poor girls family did,even though both families lived in the same rich neighborhood.I`m not a minority but I`ve noticed that people that look differently than we do seem to scare or annoy some of us.
There could be a host of problems why this kid acted like he did. Was there a school counciler that was working with him,or did they just throw him under the bus because he was "different".
When you come from a mixed neighborhood like I did,(Italian,Black,Jewish),you learn to make adjustments.I don`t think that kid deserved all that for what he did
Greenwichite says:
This whole story makes no sense. The teenager is suspended for throwing WATER BALLOONS, returns to school, refuses to go to the headmaster's office, so this is grounds for ARREST? The article says "Londono resisted arrest after refusing to report to the assistant headmaster's office following his suspension from school." This is out of control use of force people. If I were a Greenwich High Schol student I would avoid the resource officer at all costs. What will he do to gum chewers?
Ralph Brotherton Jr says:
This is a very complex issue that Im sure has not been thoroughly explored before it was approved as "policy" Where does one draw the line? And will that line move as the years go by? Are we going to next tase middle school children? and for what offence?
In a world where we don't "spank" children any more...where its a fine line between "child abuse" and parental "discipline" I think letting the police tase them is outrageous!
Im not sure what the answer is....maybe a pat on the butt wasnt so bad after all.We did get through childhood and adolescence for years without drugs....therapy.....or tasering....just old fashioned discipline.
But...no matter how you look at it....you cant help feeling that some kind of "New World Order" has arrived.
Please see:
Even More Comments About Greenwich High School Taser Incident (updated #3)
More Comments About Greenwich Student Getting Tased Three Times In The Greenwich Cafeteria (Update #6)
Reader Submited Comments About Weapon Being Fired At Greenwich High School - What Was the Crime? (Enhanced With Video) - Updated
AND:
3 Greenwich Cops Give 140 Pound Boy 50,000 Volts And A $50,000 Bail For not Going To A School Office Over Water Ballon Incident: (Updated)
ALSO:
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