Parent speaks out after 9 arrested in Ola HS food fight

[The Straight Story]

Parent speaks out after 9 arrested in Ola HS food fight

McDONOUGH, Ga. -- At least one parent of nine students arrested for a food fight at Ola High School late last week is speaking out.

Mark Striplin's 17-year-old daughter, Courtney, was cuffed and taken to jail after what he describes as "a senior prank." He said involving the Sheriff's Office and charging the kids with various misdemeanors was excessive on the part of the Henry County School District.

"I do not condone what Courtney did. I believe she should have been suspended for what happened, but to take her to jail and charge her with a crime, that's just too much," said Mark Striplin.

After the incident Friday, four of the students were juveniles and released to the custody of their parents while five others were booked into jail.

http://www.11alive.com/news/article/275824/3/9-arrested-in-Ola-HS-food-fight

[Arkansas Granny]

1. There are better ways of disciplining these student than to arrest them.

Suspension or detention, restitution, cleaning the cafeteria would make the punishment fit the crime. Arresting them and charging them with a crime is a little over the top, not to mention the fact that they will now have criminal records.

[dballance]

4. I Don't Know How Long One Has to Wait to Get Their Record Expunged

But I hope it's not too long for the sake of these kids. That was a complete waste of time and law enforcement resources to arrest them and process them through the system. So the administrators told them not to do it. How often has that stopped kids in the past? Sometimes yes, many times no. When kids didn't listen they got suspension - not a night in jail.

Total overkill. If it was the resource officer that did the arrests then s/he need to be talked to about proportional response to an event like this. S/he should certainly have rounded them up and taken them to the principal's office, but not put them in the back of a police cruiser and taken them to jail.

[SoCalMusicLover]

2. FOOD FIGHT!!

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[LeftinOH]

3. Making them clean up the mess would have been sufficient-

-and if they refused to clean it up, then consider suspensions.