Residents Say Police Went ‘Overboard’ After 13-Year-Old Charged With Felony Over Snowball

Main Entry ImageHuffington Post – by Kim Bellware

Hurling snowballs is a winter pastime for some kids, but for a 13-year-old Chicago boy it’s become a felony offense.

Chicago police say a 13-year-old boy was arrested and charged with a felony for throwing a snowball at a police officer after a West Side elementary school let out Wednesday afternoon.  

The eighth-grader, who is facing a felony charge of battery to a police officer, told the Tribune he was wrongly picked out of a crowd of kids throwing snowballs, further claiming the ball didn’t strike the cop.

“He (the officer) said the snowball hit him but it hit the car, not him,” the boy, who is a minor and was not named, told the Tribune.

The officer was sitting in a marked squad car at the time of the incident. After the snowball came from the crowd of about 15 kids, the boy and his mother said a nearby security guard and the school’s dean singled him out.

Meanwhile, several nearby residents have criticized the police’s response as overly harsh, with lingering questions as to how a felony charge for an apparent prank may come back to haunt the juvenile.

Latanya Powell, a construction worker on the block, told DNAinfo Chicago the charge was “ridiculous.”

“It’s just going overboard,” Powell said. “I can see if it were a weapon and harm was done, but it was just a snowball. This is a case of kids being kids.”

Ray Fields, an educator who lives on the block disagreed, saying an arrest could help the boy change his ways.

“If [the boy] had gotten away with it, who’s to say what they’d do next? If it doesn’t stick to them now, they’ll be 16 or 17, and they’ll have a gun,” Fields told DNAinfo.

On top of the felony charge, the boy has been suspended from school for five days. Police confirmed the boy has no gang affiliations or arrest record; he’s due in juvenile court on March 12.

Chicago isn’t the only place where police come down hard on snowball throwers.

In 2010, five young Bronx men were arrested after a cop claimed the group “bombarded” him with snowballs, according to the New York Daily News. The men later filed a $10 million false arrest suit against New York City and won; the city ultimately settled with the men, paying them each $60,000 earlier in February.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/02/21/snowball-felony-chicago_n_4831414.html

21 thoughts on “Residents Say Police Went ‘Overboard’ After 13-Year-Old Charged With Felony Over Snowball”

    2. That’s o.k., Angel. One I sent in a couple days ago was credited to Chewybees, who hasn’t posted here in I don’t know how long. (I didn’t say anything, though. Never do)

      Pssst, don’t tell Laura, but I think Henry might be hitting the sauce now and again. 🙄 😆

      Reply

      2. I asked Laura about it and she said she wasn’t sick at the time, so she must have been drunk.
        -Henry

        It has been remedied.
        -Admin, not to be confused with Henry. I’m the one who does all the goddamn work around here. He would love to confuse himself with me, then it would actually look like he does some work.

        Reply

          1. I tried to tell ya. LOL
            “Admin” is the “Chief Cook and Bottle Washer” (their words, not mine).

  2. The kid should feel fortunate he wasn’t tasered, beaten to within an inch of his life and shot a half a dozen times.

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  3. …what an embarrassing ass-clown…no wonder our country is in the shape it is… may a just God (if they exist)..may they strike down every idiot “educator” on the planet…or at least in “that block”..eh?

    RJ O’Guillory
    Author-
    Webster Groves – The Life of an Insane Family

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  4. This a prime example of overkill reaction, most likely a part of the Israeli training this “officer” received. I guess the one good thing is that this kid wasn’t shot dead by an offer that felt “threatened”. As for Mr. Ray Fields, you sir are both an idiot and an asshole. I hope you sir get a good dose of what life in a police state truly is, because no one here at the trenches will have any sympathy for you.

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  5. “Chicago police say a 13-year-old boy was arrested and charged with a felony for throwing a snowball at a police officer after a West Side elementary school let out Wednesday afternoon.”

    I can see where that could be considered a ‘deadly weapon’

    After all, it was probably chock full of chemtrails and Fukushima radiation.

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  6. I wasn’t aware that a minor could be charged with a “felony”. But then again this is the new Amerika.

    That cop is lucky that kid didn’t use some water to harden that snowball up and hurl it at his doughnut hole.

    Reply

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