8-YEAR-OLD FLORIDA BOY SUSPENDED FOR MAKING GUN SHAPE WITH FINGERS
A pretend game of cops and robbers landed a Florida elementary school boy with a very real suspension after he made a pretend gun with his thumb and index finger.
The mother of 8-year-old Jordan Bennett said her son was only playing with his friend at Harmony Community School in St. Cloud. She fears his one-day suspension, which was handed down Friday, wrongly labels Jordan as a violent person.
“There was nothing in his hand. He used his thumb and index finger,” Bonnie Bennett told WKMG-TV. “It was a game. He made no threatening advances or threats to harm anyone. No words were said.”
“They took a child that has never been in trouble before and went to the extreme,” the mother continued. “A child that has no history of violence is now classified as a violent offender.”
The school, on the other hand, said the game crossed the line established by the district’s code of conduct. A school representative told WKMG while they can’t give specifics into the incident, it was reviewed and found in violation of school policy. The school did not specify the specific code violation that was grounds for the suspension.
Bennett said she is fighting to have the suspension removed from her son’s record and is “prepared to go to court if I have to because this is wrong.”
“It’s wrong for my son and any other child if they’re faced with the same thing because of a game,” Bennett told WKMG.
This is by no means the first time a young student has been suspended for making a pretend gun with their fingers. In January, three 6-year-olds in Maryland were suspended for doing so.
More recently, three seventh grade students in Virginia playing with airsoft guns in a private front yard before school hours received long-term suspensions.