Experts criticize Michael Chitwood’s ‘shaming’ tactic of uploading videos and mugshot of teens to deter gun crime

A Florida sheriff’s novel approach to countering school shooting threats by exposing online the identities of children who make them is drawing ire from juvenile justice advocates as well as others who say the tactic is counterproductive and morally wrong.

Michael Chitwood, sheriff of Volusia county, raised eyebrows recently by posting to his Facebook page the name and mugshot of an 11-year-old boy accused of calling in a threat to a local middle school. He followed up with a video clip of the minor’s “perp walk” into jail in shackles.

Chitwood, who has said he is “fed up” with the disruption to schools caused by the hoaxes, has promised to publicly identify any student who makes such a threat. On Wednesday, another video appeared onlineshowing two youths, aged 16 and 17, in handcuffs being led into separate cells, with the sheriff calling them “knuckleheads”.

  • Stern@lemmy.world
    117·
    2 months ago

    “He doesn’t need to parade this kid, this 11-year-old child, in front of a camera to achieve his purpose. Just do traditional things – arresting, charging – that don’t add this layer of shaming, embarrassing, humiliating and traumatizing.”

    And whats your solution? This isn’t like… throwing a rock through a window or graffiti tagging a wall. Consequences need to be swift, decisive, and ensure no one gets any ideas to copycat them.

    • AA5B@lemmy.world
      31·
      2 months ago

      Maybe keeping the kids privacy will:

      • deprive a potential shooter of their publicity
      • let an innocent accused resume their lives
      • allow someone in a crisis more opportunity to get treatment/recover without making it worse

      What does this humiliation do?

      • let the sheriff enact spiteful revenge against someone not convicted
      • ruin the life of an accused innocent
      • force someone in a crisis into a more desperate state
      • help a perpetrator achieve notoriety
      • Stern@lemmy.world
        13·
        2 months ago

        deprive a potential shooter of their publicity

        Remove a potential shooter from the field you mean?

        let an innocent accused resume their lives

        Or let potential shooters know they aren’t being ignored until they start blasting.

        allow someone in a crisis more opportunity to get treatment/recover without making it worse

        Jail can also provide treatment, without the possibility of them snapping and murdering people. Seems reasonable to me.

        let the sheriff enact spiteful revenge against someone not convicted

        Identifying threats to society is “spiteful revenge” Do you think we should have referred to him as O.B.L. instead of Osama Bin Laden because he wasn’t convicted yet to keep his anonymity? That it was “spiteful revenge” to let folks know who he was? Cmon now.

        ruin the life of an accused innocent

        or stop a copycat killer.

        force someone in a crisis into a more desperate state

        who will be locked up and thus unable to act on those urges.

        help a perpetrator achieve notoriety

        Least sensible of the lot. They’ll be notorious for making threats and going to jail. Much preferrable to murder and jail.

        • AA5B@lemmy.world
          21·
          2 months ago

          This is a kid who’s been accused. There’s been no trial, no evidence, no conviction. He’s not been proven guilty of anything.

          It’s a kid. Everywhere else kids have privacy by default. Publicizing the name of this kid is not justice nor any part of justice.

          Even if he did it, we have no idea whether it was serious - calling a kid such a criminal before he’s convicted dies nothing prevent any crime

          • Stern@lemmy.world
            1·
            2 months ago

            Even if he did it, we have no idea whether it was serious

            So we shouldn’t take threats of shootings or bomb threats seriously now?

            Wow. Just… wow.

            • AA5B@lemmy.world
              11·
              2 months ago

              You’re losing the plot here. The question is whether it’s ok to publicly post the identities of kids accused of a specific crime

                  • Stern@lemmy.world
                    2·
                    2 months ago

                    The title of this thread isn’t

                    Even if he did it, we have no idea whether it was serious

                    Thats a point you made, and are now refusing to address. Twice now.

    • DominusOfMegadeus@sh.itjust.works
      65·
      2 months ago

      Have to say I agree. This seems like a good deterrent. Not sure of the legality of it, but then “legality” is open to interpretation lately in the US.