14 year old arrested for bringing home made clock to school

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They were probably thinking of what bombs look like in the movies.

Yes, maybe. Policemen shouldn't use movies as a reference.

Watched a video of him speaking earlier and he seemed potentially on the spectrum. Would make sense as a) he seemed to not understand how others might perceive his creation, b) his talent at that age for electronics would be quite likely due to a special interest and c) a special interest would explain why he was so enthusiastic that he was showing it to all his teachers even when one had warned him against it.

Anyway, it should have been obvious it wasn't a bomb with the lack of a payload. Unless they thought he was such a genius he had worked out how to split atoms with a cheap and simple circuit lol

On a personal note, perhaps that bomb-themed alarm clock I was going to make isn't such a good idea...

Also, it brings back memories of my own years in school

In year 8 a prank involving an air filled water balloon went wrong... I had it under my foot while a friend pretended to punch me in the corridor outside French class, at which time I stood on it to create a false impact noise. Only thing is, it was louder than expected, the corridor was echoey and I live in Northern Ireland, so of course, some people thought a bomb had went off... The French teacher went through us for a short-cut needless to say, although did we have the police called to accuse us of terrorism? No. That sorta thing seems to mainly happen in America...

The police also weren't called either of the two times I accidentally brought my practice nun-chuks to school from my Ju-Jitsu classes (they were in my school bag, but of course once your young friends see them - when you open your bag for totally valid reasons - there is no keeping them discrete...)

I also never got in trouble for hacking the school computer system, although I was good friends with the Admins - the school even nearly got me to make the school website - and usually the vulnerabilities I found were patched the next day

So, my school wasn't strict with that stuff, but if you had your shirt untucked too often or were late three times in a week, you got a 5 hour detention on a Saturday...

Lord knows I've done plenty of stupid things probably attributable to my Asperger's.

Glad I got kicked out of school before getting arrested was part of the package; things were a bit more civilized then. Kind of similar circumstances though, I made a sort of homemade joy buzzer kinda thing out of electric cigarette lighter parts and a mechanical pencil that would give you a static shock if you clicked it, which the school decided was a weapon. They even got our community resource officer to testify that it could have been used to detonate explosives (had it, you know, been attached to some) at my hearing when I challenged the expulsion, which is doubly hilarious now that I know so much more about such things. I can personally attest though that teachers and cops will assume that anything involving wires and tape is an explosive device, no matter how far fetched, even as a white kid in the days before 9/11.

this is not making the united states look especially good.

As someone who took things apart as a kid, I could be wrong ...but from photos it looks like he just took a large-display clock out of its normal case and put it into an inexpensive aluminum "suitcase" style case. The ribbon cable connecting the display to the circuit board is the giveaway. The third 'board is the power supply.

Also; a digital clock = display + circuit board + power supply

Considering how easily an alarm clock really can be made into a bomb by connecting an explosive device to the speaker output *and* considering how the case he put it into looks like a movie bomb, the outcome was foreseeable.

For what it's worth, the kid's been invited to the White House for his trouble.

I'm just waiting for the dittoheads to start nattering.

Of course they will. They'll say that this proves that Obama is Pro-Muslim, or they'll even say that the kid had actually tried building a bomb and was rightfully arrested.

truth is the first casualty in any war.

I've seen plenty of people on facebook arguing that this was either a stunt the kid was talked into, or that he really did intend to create a panic.

Huh! A group that overwhelmingly marginalises you, is part of a self aware species and generally s**ts on you cos of what you are by birth aint stupid!! !!

Waddya?

Naive.

See your enemy and learn how to live with him with dignity. You dont have to hate him, but no one said you had to be naive.

How is it his fault people over-reacted? and how precisely does a bomb look anyways?

Yes I am sure nothing like this could ever happen to an autistic person.

Not really, if its wasn't a bomb there was no reason for him to expect people would consider it one....not to mention its a 14 year old kid....everything doesn't always occur to adolescents. The school and authorities should have determined whether it was a bomb or not before arresting the kid....cause now it turns out it was just for no reason.

Surprised there are 'autistic' people that are so judgmental about these kinds of things considering how often we get misunderstood, or taken to be a 'threat' when we aren't.