Great moments in school discipline, Clearwater, Florida, edition:
I don’t know if I can possibly do justice to this story. In February, an 18-year old Florida high school senior named Tyler Tillung was upset at his teacher because she wouldn’t let him into the auditorium to see the high school talent show (the “annual Lip Sync show,” so perhaps “talent” is an overstatement) because the auditorium was full. So… no, I don’t think I can type this without laughing, so I’ll just cut and paste from the story:
After she declined, he mooned the teacher. The lawsuit concedes that he made the act worse “by spreading his buttocks for an instant.”
Yes, you read that right. The word “lawsuit” was in there. Tillung proceeded to metaphorically moon the rest of us by following this up with a lawsuit. For some inexplicable reason, the school decided to punish him for what he calls a “childish joke.” They suspended him for six days, and then transferred him to a school across town. So of course he’s suing.
A lawsuit filed Tuesday in Pinellas-Pasco Circuit Court alleges the transfer was unreasonably harsh because it denies him the once-in-a-lifetime chance to graduate next month with his class, participate in senior activities leading up to graduation and play his final season on Palm Harbor’s varsity baseball team.
But don’t worry: we have it on good authority (from Tillung’s lawyer) that the lawsuit has merit:
To those who say the family is taking the issue too far, Tillung’s lawyer, B. Edwin Johnson, said “they don’t know the facts.” He added: “We’re talking about his graduation. That’s an important event in a guy’s life. … This kid deserves a break.”
As do the rest of us. And especially Clearwater taxpayers.
(Some of you kind-hearted folks may be tempted to give him the benefit of the doubt. You may think that while it’s frivolous to argue that the chance to graduate with one’s friends is an injury which the courts should consider, the chance to play with his team is more important, because it could affect his college chances. Don’t think that. First, he already has his acceptance. Second, there are only six games left on the school’s schedule, all but the last within the next two weeks; he wouldn’t get back on the team in time even if he won.)
10 Comments
I would think the graduation would be an important reason not to let the kid come back. It would be fairly easy for him to get onstage with merely a shift between him another, far-more-public, moment of poor judgement.
Full disclosure: I live in Tampa, far too close to this guy for my taste.
A few days in detention would have sufficed in my day.
I suppose the boy is lucky he didn’t run up against some Scientologist. He could have been killed with just a thought!
While the forced transfer seems a tad harsh to me, if the stated policies of the school system were followed, too bad kid. Grow up and suck it up.
He can be lucky he’s not in jail and in the sex offenders’ registry – in some states, mooners gets tossed in the same pile as pedophiles.
I esp. like the part about this lad briefly displaying his rectum (and perhaps testicles). Being 18, could he not be charged as a sex offender, given the craftiness of prosecutors these days?
There is a certain odiforousness about this story that doesn’t seem quite right. Will he perhaps be asked to re-enact the gesture, should the case make it to trial?
Both the school district and the kid/parents completely overreacted and this is an ego suit.
Deoxy, got any links to show mooning gets you on the sex offender list? I’d like to make sure I’m not in one of those states before I go out drinking.
I’m predicting “It’s not about the money” will show up before seven calendar days; any takers?
The punishment seems to fit. He’s gotten into college, he will graduate high school at all…
When I was in high school, about the same time that the seniors started slacking off schoolwork, they also tuned down the illegal activities. If you’re close enough to graduation where you don’t have to work so hard, you’re close enough where punishments will really suck.
Todd: I think the odoriferousness you smell is this guy’s posterior.
The punishment might be excessive; suing over it is definitely excessive.
OTOH, am I the only one who sees a contradiction here:
‘veteran teacher Carla Webster’
‘Palm Harbor principal Herman “Doc” Allen called the episode “disgusting” and said Taylor had been argumentative and defiant before mooning Webster, whom he described as “traumatized.” ‘
I don’t think my high school class ever mooned a teacher, but anyone tough enough to survive the little things they did every day would hardly have been “traumatized” by a mooning.
Markum, this woman must be somehow related to the Tennessee football student manager who, upon being mooned by a playful Peyton Manning, sued the university for $400,000 for something like “being traumatized”, “emotional distress”, etc. (and that event was in the locker rooms, not in a public hallway).