Sean found himself in the Principal’s office again for being disruptive in class. Sean, as he was walking home with a suspension notice in his pocket, couldn’t think of anything but how his teacher had it out for him and now he was probably going to get grounded by his mom too.

After reaching an empty home, his mom was still at work, he took out his smartphone and opened Instagram. Anger and frustration welled up inside of him. He found his teacher’s Instagram account. He grabbed her profile image, posted it on his Instagram feed and impulsively wrote, “THIS IS THE UGLY ASS BITCH THAT GOT ME SUSPENDED!” Without a second thought, Sean hit the send button. One like, two likes…23 likes on that post. Sean wasn’t finished, he continued, “THE FIRE INSIDE ME IS BURNING RN AND I WANT TO CUT THAT BITCH.” The moment Sean hit the send button, he committed a felony.

The school threat assessment team and I were alerted by the school because the posts were public. There was no taking them back. Several screen shots of the posts were sent to me. I arrived at Sean’s apartment and sat down with him and his mother. I did a full threat assessment to determine if Sean posed a threat to the school or the teacher. My assessment was that Sean was angry, and in the moment posted those comments with no intention of hurting his teacher. Sean, like most teens, has impulse control problems and has no sense of accountability when using social media.

I wrote a crime report that in time disappeared from his record when Sean successfully completed the classes and counseling appointments in our diversion program. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said about his school record. His one-day suspension turned into a five-day suspension, and he was finally expelled. In Sean’s expulsion hearing, I was called to give the facts of my investigation. Sean looked at me with tears in his eyes and said, “I am so sorry, I am so sorry.” I replied, “I am sorry to ...