Ameriacan Muslim Youngster Ahmed Mohamed creates clock, Bring to school, gets arrested
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| Ameriacan Muslim Youngster Ahmed Mohamed creates clock, Bring to school, gets arrested |
Ameriacan Muslim Youngster Ahmed Mohamed creates clock, Bring to school, gets arrested
(CNN News) When Ahmed Mohamed go to his high school in Irving,
Texas, Monday, he was so excited. A youngster with thoughts of becoming an
engineer, he wanted to demonstrate his teacher the digital clock he'd made from
a pencil box. The 14-year-old's day finished not with praise, but punishment,
after the school called police and he was under arrest. "I built a clock
to impress my teacher but when I show it to her, she thought it was a danger to
her," Ahmed told journalists Wednesday. "It was really sad that she
took the wrong impression of it."
Ahmed talked to the media gathered on his frontage yard and
appeared to wear the same NASA T-shirt he had on in a photograph taken as he
was being arrested. In the image, he looks mystified and upset as he's being
led out of school in chains. "They arrested me and they told me that I dedicated
the crime of a hoax bomb, a fake bomb," the freshman later explains to
WFAA after authorities released him.
Irving Police spokesman Officer James McClellan tell the
station, "We attempted to question the juvenile about what it was and he
would simply only tell us that it was a clock." The youngster did that
because, well, it was a clock, he said. On Wednesday, police announce the teen
will not be charged.
Chief Larry Boyd said Ahmed should have been "approaching"
by going ahead of the description that what he made was a clock. But Boyd said
authorities resolute that the teenager did not mean to alarm any person and the
gadget, which the chief called "a homemade experiment," was safe.
Ahmed, who aspire to go to MIT, said he was delighted the
charges were dropped and not worried that police didn't apologize for arresting
him. After he said he was interrogated by police without an legal
representative present, his lawyer, Linda Moreno, told journalists they
wouldn't answer any more questions about the official process. Ahmed is
suspended until Thursday, he said, but is thinking about transferring to
another high school.
Social media reacts
Outrage over the occasion with many saying the student was
profiled because he's Muslim -- spread on social media as #IStandWithAhmed
started trending global on Twitter with more than 100,000 tweets Tuesday
morning. The school's Facebook page is roiling with pointed disapproval of the
way the teen was treated, and the hashtag #engineersforahmed is gaining
popularity.
President Barrack Obama, independent presidential applicant
Hillary Clinton, U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan and thousands of
others are viewing support for Ahmed. "Cool clock, Ahmed," Obama
tweeted. "Want to bring it to the White House? We should motivate more
kids like you to like science. It's what makes America grand." The
President would like the youngster to join him and other scientists next month
for the White House's annual Astronomy Night, White House press secretary Josh
Earnest said Wednesday.
Ahmed said Wednesday he was going to the White House.
Clinton tweeted that "assumption don't keep us safe" and urge the teen
to "keep building." "I think this wouldn't even be a inquiry if
his name wasn't Ahmed Mohamed," said Alia Salem of the Council on
American-Islamic Relations. "He is an excited kid who is very brilliant
and wants to share it with his teachers." Many criticize the school on
Facebook. Its creator, Mark Zuckerberg, posted his support.
"Having the skill and dream to build something cool
should guide to praise, not arrest. The future belongs to people like
Ahmed," Zuckerberg wrote. "Ahmed, if you ever want to come by
Facebook, I'd love to meet up you. Keep building."
Mocking Irving Schools' motto, Bill Cain wrote: "'Where
children come first' ... to jail in handcuffs. Way to go, Irving."
Chance Williams posted, "Ahmed Mohamed deserve community
regret from you, the school administrators, police, and teachers involved in
his arrest. I hope he sues, and the school district has to give for his college
education."
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