# Kid charged with terroristic threats for writing a zombie story. **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [March 5, 2005, 5:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kid-charged-with-terroristic-threats-for-writing-a-zombie-story/293104 "2005-03-05T17:59:20Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 16\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![The\_Asbestos\_Mango](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/edb3f5/32.png) [@The\_Asbestos\_Mango](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Asbestos_Mango)\ **Post date:** [March 10, 2005, 4:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kid-charged-with-terroristic-threats-for-writing-a-zombie-story/293104/61 "2005-03-10T16:10:31Z")
I think the key words would be “read in court”. Unless you really think prosecutors who were really hot to railroad a teenaged boy for terrorism would actually read his writings complete and in context for the court. From what I’ve been able to find (which is admittedly sketchy), it sounds like grandparents found boy’s creative writing journal (hey, I had one too, and there was stuff in that which in these paranoid times probably would have gotten my prodigious but shapely ass sent directly to juvie, do not pass Go), which included the aforementioned zombie story, plus maybe some works in progress that maybe included a war story, some stuff concerned with groups of students taking over a fictional high school, etc. Said grandparents panicked, called the cops who, being idiots, arrested the boy. Also, in order for the writings to qualify as a “terrorist threat” wouldn’t they have needed to be, oh, I don’t know, put into an envelope and conveyed to, say, the school principal, and possibly worded in such a way as to indicate that the events depicted would be carried out by the writer? I don’t think a notebook in a kid’s room with what is apparently a collection of fictional writing meets the legal definition of “threat”. ---
**Author:** ![FinnAgain](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/finnagain/32/12500_2.png) [@FinnAgain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FinnAgain)\ **Post date:** [March 10, 2005, 4:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kid-charged-with-terroristic-threats-for-writing-a-zombie-story/293104/62 "2005-03-10T16:19:45Z")
> [@The Asbestos Mango](#): > > which included the aforementioned zombie story,. Why do people keep calling it this? It’s one of the kid’s lies! There was no zombie story, there were no ‘zombies’ in it, it was just a story about killing a bunch of people. Come on Dopers! ---
**Author:** ![The\_Asbestos\_Mango](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/edb3f5/32.png) [@The\_Asbestos\_Mango](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Asbestos_Mango)\ **Post date:** [March 10, 2005, 10:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kid-charged-with-terroristic-threats-for-writing-a-zombie-story/293104/63 "2005-03-10T22:24:32Z")
There were no zombies in the portion _read in court_. Come on children. We have people here in this forum who will quote another poster out of context in order to rail against them for a position the quoted post doesn’t even make. I wouldn’t put it past a cop, prosecutor, or whoever, to read selected parts of a zombie story in which a group of people is collecting weapons to fight the zombies, but conveniently leave out the parts with the actual zombies. The kid is being railroaded. ---
**Author:** ![Justin\_Bailey](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/justin_bailey/32/8792_2.png) [@Justin\_Bailey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Justin_Bailey)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2005, 12:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kid-charged-with-terroristic-threats-for-writing-a-zombie-story/293104/64 "2005-03-11T00:08:38Z")
> [@The Asbestos Mango](#): > > There were no zombies in the portion _read in court_. > > Come on children. We have people here in this forum who will quote another poster out of context in order to rail against them for a position the quoted post doesn’t even make. > > I wouldn’t put it past a cop, prosecutor, or whoever, to read selected parts of a zombie story in which a group of people is collecting weapons to fight the zombies, but conveniently leave out the parts with the actual zombies. > > The kid is being railroaded. Be realistic. If this goes to trial then the defense will have access to the notebook too. And they will be able to read from the word “zombies” from the same story from the same book that the prosecution says isn’t in the book at all. The prosecution’s case would fly right out the window. No one is that stupid. It looks this is one case where the fiction is finally stranger than the truth. ---
**Author:** ![Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/earl_snake-hips_tucker/32/3269_2.png) [@Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Earl_Snake-Hips_Tucker)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2005, 1:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kid-charged-with-terroristic-threats-for-writing-a-zombie-story/293104/65 "2005-03-11T01:14:44Z")
[A precedent](http://www.freedomforum.org/templates/document.asp?documentID=10270). ---
**Author:** ![dwyr](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dwyr/32/363_2.png) [@dwyr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dwyr)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2005, 1:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kid-charged-with-terroristic-threats-for-writing-a-zombie-story/293104/66 "2005-03-11T01:17:33Z")
Sorry to be unclear. There were no zombies mentioned in any of his writings, period. Not just the ones released. I should also mention that I live in the next county and am getting the local news, not just what makes it to the web. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Asbestos\_Mango](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/edb3f5/32.png) [@The\_Asbestos\_Mango](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Asbestos_Mango)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2005, 1:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kid-charged-with-terroristic-threats-for-writing-a-zombie-story/293104/67 "2005-03-11T01:33:39Z")
Ah, well, that does change things a little. But I still don’t think that a kid should be arrested and put on trial for “making terrorist threats” over something he wrote in a freaking notebook/journal. If the authorities have concrete evidence that he was actually planning/conspiring to commit a crime, then they can have at it, but writing in a notebook should not legally constitute a threat. ---
**Author:** ![Merijeek](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f05b48/32.png) [@Merijeek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Merijeek)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2005, 3:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kid-charged-with-terroristic-threats-for-writing-a-zombie-story/293104/68 "2005-03-11T03:57:29Z")
Okay… So this kid was collecting guns, ammo and cash to, supposedly, take over the school and kill a bunch of people. And he may or may not have had an accomplice. And the poor and innocent people of the world will be protected from this by…$5k in bail? Well, I sure as hell feel safer. Now we can all sleep with our doors unlocked and our widnows open. Either this kid is a dangerous psychopath or this is a case of Zero Tolerance Gone Awry. The story coming from the gummint indicates the former while the paltry bail indicates the latter. ---
**Author:** ![FinnAgain](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/finnagain/32/12500_2.png) [@FinnAgain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FinnAgain)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2005, 4:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kid-charged-with-terroristic-threats-for-writing-a-zombie-story/293104/69 "2005-03-11T04:07:14Z")
Then again, maybe his family can’t scrape up 5K so it’s effective. Also, I think they should throw the book at him however they can. If they can make a terrorism charge stick, so be it. Obviously planning a massacre is a crime, I don’t care exactly how they classify it. ---
**Author:** ![phouka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/c5a1d2/32.png) [@phouka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/phouka)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2005, 4:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kid-charged-with-terroristic-threats-for-writing-a-zombie-story/293104/70 "2005-03-11T16:17:06Z")
Well, $5K may be plenty to keep the kid in jail if no one’s willing to post it for him. It does, however, seem a little low in proportion to the accusations leveled against him. And I can’t help but wonder how much trouble I’d get into if I used the same sentences I did a few years back when I was teaching my eighth graders subjects, predicates, and basic sentence diagramming. I had just read _The Deluxe Transitive Vampire_, so the exercise I put up on the board was: > [@](#): > > Copy the following sentences and underline the subject once and the predicate twice: > > - Vampires drink human blood. > - Zombies eat human brains. Then, when I reviewed the sentences with them, I made them say it outloud. Had my principal walked in at that moment, I think I would have had some explaining to do. ---
**Author:** ![Zebra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/c0e974/32.png) [@Zebra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zebra)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2005, 4:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kid-charged-with-terroristic-threats-for-writing-a-zombie-story/293104/71 "2005-03-11T16:58:24Z")
> [@cricetus](#): > > It seems like there’s a slate of these pit threads that turn out to be quite a bit more than the meets the eye. It’s like the third I’ve seen recently from Dio, including the Cosby thread and the rubber band issue. I would think at this point he should know better. The stories are grabbed up and spinned by the media just to get you outraged. Don’t be such a Pavlov dog when you react to them. A while back there seem to be many pit threads that were based on articles at Fox News. The OPs agreed with the article and flamed some person being expoused as a jerk. But then Dopers would fill in the rest of the story and usually, not always, the OP would get it. I think many news articles are written one-sided and in an inflamatory way. It seems like ‘extreme news’ is the fashion of the day. ---
**Author:** ![Mojo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Mojo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mojo)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2005, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kid-charged-with-terroristic-threats-for-writing-a-zombie-story/293104/72 "2005-03-11T17:56:26Z")
Here’s a [better version of the story](http://www.wtvq.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=WTVQ/MGArticle/TVQ_BasicArticle&c=MGArticle&cid=1031781458489&path=) that has more details but could really use a paragraph break. in before **Diogenes** changes his story yet doesn’t recant or apologize. ---
**Author:** ![Mycroft\_H](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/898d66/32.png) [@Mycroft\_H](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mycroft_H)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2005, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kid-charged-with-terroristic-threats-for-writing-a-zombie-story/293104/73 "2005-03-11T20:40:52Z")
> [@FisherQueen](#): > > Just this week, one of my students wrote a story and read it aloud to the class. In the story, she waited for me after school and stabbed me to death. > > Yeah, I turned it in to the principal. \ Wow – absolutely wow. Your response was extremely warranted. I do count my blessings about when and where I went to school and that (I don’t believe) these sorts of problems were going on. I really can’t imagine the problems in some district schools and the things that teachers have to experience. Good luck with all you do. **phouka** – I bet most of your kids thought you were cool with your approach. But as you, the OP and others relate, it is a different world than it was previously. There are a lot of cases of overreaction and it frustrates me to consider the stupidity of school administrators. But I’m wise enough to realize that there are untold experiences daily where disciplinary reactions are warranted and probably someone’s life is saved. It has to be very hard to draw that line, and lots of times it is drawn in the wrong spot. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Asbestos\_Mango](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/edb3f5/32.png) [@The\_Asbestos\_Mango](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Asbestos_Mango)\ **Post date:** [March 12, 2005, 4:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kid-charged-with-terroristic-threats-for-writing-a-zombie-story/293104/74 "2005-03-12T04:17:11Z")
> [@FinnAgain](#): > > Then again, maybe his family can’t scrape up 5K so it’s effective. > Also, I think they should throw the book at him however they can. If they can make a terrorism charge stick, so be it. Obviously planning a massacre is a crime, I don’t care exactly how they classify it. Except that if **Mojo’s** linked article is any indication, there is no evidence that Poole was planning a massacre. Zombies or no, it still reads an awful lot like a fictional writing in a kid’s joiurnal. I don’t see any indication that the police have found any actual weapons, or actual people that the kid was connected with who would supply him with weapons. All they have is some stuff he wrote in his journal. And if writing stuff in your journal is a crime, then we’re probably all in a lot of trouble. ---
**Author:** ![FinnAgain](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/finnagain/32/12500_2.png) [@FinnAgain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FinnAgain)\ **Post date:** [March 12, 2005, 4:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kid-charged-with-terroristic-threats-for-writing-a-zombie-story/293104/75 "2005-03-12T04:21:20Z")
What of the allegation that he was trying to organize it, regarldless of his chances at pulling it off? The police have claimed that they’re recovered text of him trying to convince other students to help him. Are they lying? ---
**Author:** ![The\_Asbestos\_Mango](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/edb3f5/32.png) [@The\_Asbestos\_Mango](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Asbestos_Mango)\ **Post date:** [March 12, 2005, 4:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kid-charged-with-terroristic-threats-for-writing-a-zombie-story/293104/76 "2005-03-12T04:53:58Z")
Was this “text” actual correspondence with other students he was trying to recruit, or was it just some stuff he wrote in his journal? See, this is the problem. I haven’t seen anything that indicates that the police have any real evidence that the kid was planning to commit any actual crime. All they have is some apparently fictional writings in his journal. If what they have is , page 26 in the journal “I slipped a note into Billy Bob’s locker, and another into Bubba’s lunchbox asking if they could lay their hands on a couple of Kalashnikovs”, and nothing to indicate that Billy Bob and Bubba are anything more than fictional characters in the story, well, technically they aren’t lying about having “text of him trying to convince other students to help him”, but they still have no evidence of any real plan to commit any real crime. If, on the other hand, there is an actual, in the flesh Billy Bob and an actual, in the flesh Bubba, both of whom exist in objective reality, who have handed over actual notes written by the young Mr. Poole asking for their assistance in gathering weapons, and possibly participation in a plot for an armed takeover of the actual high school, well, then we have a real plan to commit a real crime. Near as I can tell, though, all the cops have is some stuff some kid wrote in his journal. Writing stuff in your journal wasn’t a crime, last I checked. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kid-charged-with-terroristic-threats-for-writing-a-zombie-story/293104.md?page=3)