Why Are We Reading Their Names?

I don't get this, Mark Steyn points to the seemingly ridiculous cases against Cory Mashburn and Ryan Cornelison, both 13 and their names and faces are being splashed all over the news. It's bad enough that, at least from what I've read, it appears they are being railroaded on some trumped-up charges by the PC Police, but we already know the lengths media goes to protect the identities of under-aged gang members and even murderers. Suddenly these two young boys are fair game?

Messrs Mashburn and Cornelison are pupils at Patton Middle School. They were arrested in February after being observed in the vestibule, swatting girls on the butt. Butt-swatting had apparently become a form of greeting at the school – like "a handshake we do," as one female student put it. On "Slap Butt Fridays," boys and girls would hail each other with a cheery application of manual friction to the posterior, akin to a Masonic greeting.

The boys spent five days in a juvenile detention facility and were charged with several counts of felony sex abuse for what they and their parents said was merely inappropriate but not criminal behavior.

Comments

[Kaitain]

Didn't you get the memo? Liberals are trying to create a utopian society much like the one in Demolition Day. No contacts whatsoever!

[RJ]

Prosecutors are out of control. Their incentives are skewed, so that justice is way down the list of reasons why they do anything.

[seekeronos]

Once again, here is our liberal social barometer for determining guilt and innocence, (never mind common sense and scope) and the punishments to fit the crime:

White male = "go to jail"

Everyone else = "poor victims of the evil white male corporate patriarchy" (even if they are actually guilty of heinous crimes)

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At the most, these boys need a swift kick in the rear end, and a few days in weekend detention hall (i.e. school detention, not juvenile hall)

Make the example out of them, and the horseplay would otherwise cease. Trying to pin them for sex crimes for slapping other classmates (boys included as well as the girls) is beyond ludicrous.

[daveinboca]

The prosecutor is beneath contempt and rivals Durham dodo nimrod Nifong for vacuous villainy. Is this proto-CroMagnon running for some sort of PC proxy-office? Or just a headline hog? And why are these kids names being published when here in bocaland, illegal immigrant murderers under 18 are protected via anonymity? Maybe the state of Organ is different.

[Phoenix]

This stuff makes me sick. We have truly lost our minds. I think the boys should be forced to butt-slap the prosecutors.

I used to watch football games and get a charge out of how silly the guys got when they made a touchdown. Some teams got these great routines down, and it was such a kick to watch their jubilation. Then they stopped all displays of joy because it hurt the other team's feelings. Haven't watch a game since.

[bloodrage bob]

so let's recap! white, 13-year-old butt patters.... gotta ID them! keep the community safe!

black, 15-year-old rapists/murderers ... nope. gotta keep the names *sealed*. protect they muhhfuhhn *rights*, know what i'm sayin'?

and the asshole FBI agents and senior administrators who conspired to keep 4 innocent guys in prison for 35 years in order to allow their informant to remain free .... we haven't seen THEIR names in print anywhere, now have we? we're not hearing talk of THEM being prosecuted for their crime, are we? hmmm. SEEMS like a double standard. but maybe it's just me.

[Scrapiron]

When will a group of parents stand up to the idiots (Churchill comes to mind) that run the schools and the left wing Nifong's of the country? A midnight visit with a ball bat should work, if that doesn't a few slit throats would.

[chris]

Wow, lot of anger on here. Is this why the rednecks homeschool??

[Fred Beloit]

christamfordmum surprises me. Does he endorse this prosecutor and his ridiculously bad judgement??

[memomachine]

Hmmmm.

Ok. Sooooooooo.

Liberals demand that underage girls should have the privacy to have abortions without parental notification BUT having kids slap each other on the ass is completely beyond the pale?

Liberals demand that underage kids should be taught about homosexual sex BUT kids slapping each other on the ass bad?

Are they out of their minds?

[91B30]

Someone on another site (can't remember where) had a pretty good quote about stuff like this-he said "when the boomers were teenagers they were all about mind-expanding drugs and free love. Now that they are in charge they are sending kids to jail for carrying aspirin to school and kissing little girls."

Heh.

[Dusty]

I, too, was surprised at seeing their names pubished. This is very out of the ordinary and unless it was granted, or even promoted, by the parents and the boys, it is very hypocritical of the media.

slightly OT, I was going to leave a comment at the AOL news link, but thought it might get lost in the 18,000+ other comments. Wow, is that usual at the AOL site?

BTW, they have a poll up currently running against charging the boys with 87% of 510,000 votes saying NO.

[Dusty]

[Fred Beloit | Monday, July 30, 2007 at 11:03 AM]

It isn't just the prosecutor. That the principal arranged for and the police even took the boys away to other than their home is judgment just as ridiculous. (BTW where is christamfordmum?) Keeping the two in juvenile detention for 5 days borders on the criminal. Most adults arrested for serious crimes get out on bail sooner than that, often the next day.

A whole bunch of adults should be losing their jobs over this.

[seekeronos]

Dusty:

Don't look for...
chris/BobinStamford/Kelvin/Artie/Carl/Glenn/Donnie/onWolfBlitzer/onComet/onStupid/onSixHundredOtherSockPuppets

... *let me catch my breath* ...

Right.

Don't look for his honest response to any conversation on this blog. All he is is a wannabe Marxist troll and a partisan hack who is about as intellectually stimulating as a organ-grinder's retarded pet monkey.

Of course, comparing him to the same just might be insulting to retarded organ grinder monkeys, so...

[Fred Beloit]

Dusty "A whole bunch of adults should be losing their jobs over this." I like it. Same with the Kur'an in the toilet "felony" authorities.