Teen Changes Wallpaper On Teacher's Computer; Gets Charged With A Felony By Sheriff's OfficeHere's the basic story:
The Pasco County Sheriff's Office has charged Domanik Green, an eighth-grader at Paul R. Smith Middle School, with an offense against a computer system and unauthorized access, a felony. Sheriff Chris Nocco said Thursday that Green logged onto the school's network on March 31 using an administrative-level password without permission. He then changed the background image on a teacher's computer to one showing two men kissing.
Obviously it's going way too far to charge a kid with a felony over something as petty as this and you can read the article for more, but a couple of the comments are quite good. First there's this one, which takes the ideas presented in the article to their logical conclusion:
Well, they only got him arrested because he could have accessed tests. Since the whole previous incident involved webcams, he should be glad he did not get booked for child pornography charges. After all, he had access to a webcam and a child, and it likely can be proven that he had undressed the child (namely himself) on previous occasions. These days, it is probably easiest to arrest people for being in the U.S.A., and if one takes a look at incarceration rates, it seems not too far from what is actually happening. Maybe just put a fence around the entire country, not just the Mexican border, and put everybody on probation.
And then there's this one which provides a pretty good theory as to why these sorts of things happen:
This is how it works.
If you follow policy then you are not held responsible for the outcome.
If you used discretion, even if it was in good faith (e.g. rational, compassionate or proportionate to the circumstances) then you are held responsible for the outcome, even if the outcome had nothing to do with the decision you made.
In this case, held responsible can be anything from being publicly censured to fired to sued directly by parents or even imprisoned.
So people follow policy because if they have to choose between some other guy's kid or their own ass, they're going to cover their own ass. Every. Single. Time.