14 Year Old Brings Homemade Clock To School. Teacher Says It Looks Like A Bomb. Cops Arrest Him.
Could the fact that it’s Texas and his name is Ahmed Mohamed have anything to do with this?
Ahmed Mohamed is by definition, if not by diploma, an engineer. The book you see behind him in the photo above is titled The Engineering Book. He likes to make things, and by all accounts he’s very good at it.Â
Ahmed Mohamed attends MacArthur High School in Irving, Texas, and on Monday he brought a clock he made to school. He showed it to his engineering teacher who suggested he not show it to anyone else.
Later, when the clock’s alarm accidentally went off, another teacher got upset, and after class Ahmed showed the teacher it was just a clock he made. She confiscated it.
Shortly after, a police officer and the school principal removed Ahmed from his next class. He was escorted into a room with four other cops.
“Yup,” a police officer Ahmed says he has never seen before exclaimed. “That’s who I thought it was.”
The Dallas Morning News reports “officers searched his belongings and questioned his intentions. The principal threatened to expel him if he didn’t make a written statement, he said.”
“They were like, ‘So you tried to make a bomb?’†Ahmed said.
“I told them no, I was trying to make a clock.â€
“He said, ‘It looks like a movie bomb to me.’â€
Instead of going to the student council meeting, Ahmed, wearing a NASA t-shirt, was arrested and handcuffed in front of his fellow students, taken from school, and later fingerprinted.Â
I expect they will have more to say tomorrow, but Ahmed’s sister asked me to share this photo. A NASA shirt! pic.twitter.com/nR4gt992gB
— Anil Dash (@anildash) September 16, 2015
He apparently was also interrogated without an attorney or his parents present, and says he was not allowed to call them during the interrogation. Hopefully the ACLU or a civil rights attorney will be working on this.
“We have no information that he claimed it was a bomb,†Police spokesperson James McLellan, defending the actions of police officers, says. “He kept maintaining it was a clock, but there was no broader explanation.â€
UPDATE:Â Here’s A Photo Of The Clock That Got a 14 Year Old Boy Arrested For Making A ‘Hoax Bomb’
MacArthur High School’s principal has suspended Ahmed for three days.Â
The Dallas Morning News adds, “Police say they may yet charge him with making a hoax bomb — though they acknowledge he told everyone who would listen that it’s a clock.”
Here’s Ahmed’s account:
On Twitter, people are using the hashtag #IStandWithAhmed to express support and outrage:
#IStandWithAhmed because I built a transistor radio in 6th grade and no one mistook it for a bomb. That kid should be winning science fairs.
— Sarah Connors (@sarah_connors) September 16, 2015
Oh God No! SOMEONE PLACED A GIANT BOMB IN THE MIDDLE OF THIS TOWER! #IStandWithAhmed pic.twitter.com/FJZB4GpZtX
— Ol’ QWERTY Bastard (@TheDiLLon1) September 16, 2015
#IStandWithAhmed if seeing a child in handcuffs for making a clock doesnt make you feel awful. There is something extremely wrong
— Bitter Chocolate Man (@ILLCapitano94) September 16, 2015
Good to see #IStandWithAhmed as the top trending hashtag – small consolation but still nice
— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) September 16, 2015
So I see Texas has once again not only shown just how pathetic their education system is they did so with a side of racism. #IStandWithAhmed
— Brenden Dilley (@Hublife) September 16, 2015
PS Let’s stop calling it “juvenile detention.” It’s jail. This kid was taken to jail. Words matter. #IStandWithAhmed https://t.co/er6vMSFrZF
— Matt Algren (@MattAlgren) September 16, 2015
I like clocks. And tiger holograms. And robots too. #IStandWithAhmed RT @questlove: Nerds Unite. #IStandWithAhmed http://t.co/7hJxN4IB4T
— Sophia Bush (@SophiaBush) September 16, 2015
When a kid who loves robotics builds a clock & wants to show his classmates, we should celebrate him. Not arrest him. #IStandWithAhmed
— Sophia Bush (@SophiaBush) September 16, 2015
I have read this 14 times, every ounce of mental capacity and human spirit can’t make sense of this. #IStandWithAhmed pic.twitter.com/zEhN3WWiCG
— Hanif J. Williams (@HanifJWilliams) September 16, 2015
Here is a crap statement by Irving School. I fixed it for them. #IStandWithAhmed http://t.co/oJgy2bjo4N pic.twitter.com/qW8abiiCgI
— heidi heilig (@heidiheilig) September 16, 2015
Both of these photos were taken in Texas. Let that sink in for a moment. #IStandWithAhmed pic.twitter.com/1EhYSfWjZs
— Dab Aggin (@DabAggin) September 16, 2015
you’re arresting a 14 year old student for his talent/intelligence and assuming it as a threat due to his religion/race? #IStandwithAhmed
— Carolina (@carolinaagraham) September 16, 2015
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Image: Screenshot via The Dallas Morning News/YouTube
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