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{{Use mdy dates|date=September 2015}}
{{Use mdy dates|date=September 2015}}
[[File:Ahmed Mohamed device.jpg|thumb|Police photo of the clock Mohamed took to school]]
[[File:Ahmed Mohamed device.jpg|thumb|Police photo of the clock Mohamed took to school]]
In September 2015, 14-year-old Texas freshman Ahmed Mohamed was suspended from school and detained by police under suspicion of possessing a hoax bomb, after bringing a dis-assembled [[Micronta]]<ref name="clockanalysis">{{cite web |url=http://blogs.artvoice.com/techvoice/2015/09/17/reverse-engineering-ahmed-mohameds-clock-and-ourselves/ |title=Reverse Engineering Ahmed Mohamed’s Clock… and Ourselves. |last=Chase |first=Anthony |date=September 17, 2015 |website=Artvoice |publisher=Khansama Publications, Inc. |access-date=September 24, 2015}}</ref> [[digital clock]] to school to show to his engineering teacher. Mohamed, studying at [[MacArthur High School (Irving, Texas)|MacArthur High School]], was taken into custody by police, handcuffed and transported to a detention facility, fingerprinted, and suspended from school. The case sparked debates on [[racial profiling]] and [[Islamophobia]], and Mohamed received expressions of support from many sources, including [[U.S. President]] [[Barack Obama]], [[Hillary Clinton presidential campaign, 2016|presidential candidate]] [[Hillary Clinton]], [[Facebook]] founder [[Mark Zuckerberg]], and retired astronaut [[Chris Hadfield]].
In September 2015, 14-year-old Texas freshman Ahmed Mohamed was suspended from school and detained by police under suspicion of possessing a hoax bomb, after dis-assembling a [[Micronta]] [[digital clock]], transplanting its guts into in a miniature briefcase style pencil box <ref name="clockanalysis">{{cite web |url=http://blogs.artvoice.com/techvoice/2015/09/17/reverse-engineering-ahmed-mohameds-clock-and-ourselves/ |title=Reverse Engineering Ahmed Mohamed’s Clock… and Ourselves. |last=Chase |first=Anthony |date=September 17, 2015 |website=Artvoice |publisher=Khansama Publications, Inc. |access-date=September 24, 2015}}</ref> and bringing the artifact to school in order to show it to his engineering teacher. Mohamed, studying at [[MacArthur High School (Irving, Texas)|MacArthur High School]], was taken into custody by police to clarify if he deliberately made an hoax bomb by making it look like a suspicious device and trying to lead the school to think he had a bomb. After first interrogation in school, Ahmed Mohamed was handcuffed and transported to a juvenile detention facility and suspended. No charges where raised but the device was taken into custody for ongoing investigation.
The case sparked debates on [[racial profiling]] and [[Islamophobia]], and Mohamed received expressions of support from many sources, including [[U.S. President]] [[Barack Obama]], [[Hillary Clinton presidential campaign, 2016|presidential candidate]] [[Hillary Clinton]], [[Facebook]] founder [[Mark Zuckerberg]], and retired astronaut [[Chris Hadfield]].


== Ahmed Mohamed ==
== Ahmed Mohamed ==

Revision as of 13:45, 24 September 2015

File:Ahmed Mohamed device.jpg
Police photo of the clock Mohamed took to school

In September 2015, 14-year-old Texas freshman Ahmed Mohamed was suspended from school and detained by police under suspicion of possessing a hoax bomb, after dis-assembling a Micronta digital clock, transplanting its guts into in a miniature briefcase style pencil box [1] and bringing the artifact to school in order to show it to his engineering teacher. Mohamed, studying at MacArthur High School, was taken into custody by police to clarify if he deliberately made an hoax bomb by making it look like a suspicious device and trying to lead the school to think he had a bomb. After first interrogation in school, Ahmed Mohamed was handcuffed and transported to a juvenile detention facility and suspended. No charges where raised but the device was taken into custody for ongoing investigation.

The case sparked debates on racial profiling and Islamophobia, and Mohamed received expressions of support from many sources, including U.S. President Barack Obama, presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, and retired astronaut Chris Hadfield.

Ahmed Mohamed

Mohamed comes from a Muslim family and is the son of Mohamed Elhassan Mohamed, an immigrant and entrepreneur from Sudan who has twice sought to be elected the Sudanese president.[2]

Arrest

Mohamed, a 14-year-old freshman who attended MacArthur High School at the time, assembled a clock at his home during the weekend, on September 13, 2015. As the Dallas Morning News characterized it, "Ahmed's clock was hardly his most elaborate creation. He said he threw it together in about 20 minutes before bedtime on Sunday: a circuit board and power supply wired to a digital display, all strapped inside a case with a tiger hologram on the front."[3]

On the next day, September 14, 2015, he brought the clock to school to show it to his engineering teacher. His teacher, upon seeing the clock, said, "That's really nice", but advised him to keep the device in his backpack for the rest of the school day.[3] However, Mohamed later plugged it in during his English class, and the clock beeped. The English teacher requested to see it, and said, "Well, it looks like a bomb. Don't show it to anyone else."[4] Mohamed closed it with a cable, later saying it was "'cause I didn't want to lock it to make it seem like a threat, so I just used a simple cable so it won't look that much suspicious."[4] The English teacher reported him to the school principal's office, and the police were called. The principal and a police officer then took him out of class and led him to a room where four other officers were waiting.[3] After interrogating him for about an hour and a half, he was taken into custody for "possession of a hoax bomb", escorted out of the school in handcuffs, taken to a juvenile detention center, and fingerprinted before being released to his parents.[3][5][6][7][8][9][10] According to Mohamed, he was not allowed to contact his family during the questioning and he was threatened by the principal with being expelled unless he would sign a written statement.[3] Even after releasing him, the police refused to accept that he only built the device as a clock and did not intend it to appear to be a bomb, saying, "He kept maintaining it was a clock, but there was no broader explanation."[3][11]

Mohamed was suspended from school for three days.[12] The school said he was welcome to return after that, and defended its actions.[13]

Under Texas law, it is illegal to possess a "hoax bomb" with an intent to "make another believe that the hoax bomb is an explosive or incendiary device" or to "cause [an] alarm or reaction of any type by an official of a public safety agency or volunteer agency organized to deal with emergencies."[14] Although Mohamed was never formally charged with any crime, many of his supporters have speculated that his interrogation and subsequent transfer by police to a juvenile center for processing is an example of Islamophobia in the United States.[15] Others, such as Wall Street Journal commentator James Taranto, have said Mohamed's mistreatment is not uncommon; he points to a similar story from 2001 in New Jersey, in which a nine-year-old boy was suspended for a week and received a year of probation for creating a fake bomb.[16] The town of Irving has reportedly had a long history of Islamophobia and racial profiling.[17][18]

Reactions

After the initial report by The Dallas Morning News caught his attention, tech blogger Anil Dash created a form online for people to send supportive messages and thoughts on how to encourage Mohamed's creativity. Dash was among the earliest to widely publicize the story about Mohamed through social media to his more than 500,000 Twitter followers, in addition to being first to tweet the photo of Mohamed handcuffed while wearing a faded NASA T-shirt. Within hours, the hashtag #IStandWithAhmed began trending on Twitter and Dash had received thousands of responses.[19][20]

Following the incident, Mohamed received support from President Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and Mark Zuckerberg. President Obama wrote on Twitter, "Cool clock, Ahmed. Want to bring it to the White House? We should inspire more kids like you to like science. It's what makes America great", and Zuckerberg invited him to the headquarters of Facebook. Ahmed and his family announced that he was going to the White House for an annual Astronomy Night, in which he would have the opportunity to meet other aspiring young scientists.[21][22] Google invited him to attend its science fair, urging him to bring the clock along; when he arrived he "received a warm welcome, touring the booths and taking pictures with finalists."[23][24] Twitter offered him a chance to intern with them.[25] Retired Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield invited Mohamed to his science show in Toronto.[26] According to social analytics site Topsy, close to a million people sent out tweets with the supportive hashtag #IstandwithAhmed in less than 24 hours.[27]

George Takei, the Japanese-American actor who played Sulu on Star Trek, penned an open letter to Mohamed, offering his support and comparing the cause of being taken into custody by police to the same mindset that led to the Japanese internment in the United States during World War II.[28]

Responses

In a debate among Presidential candidates of the Republican Party, Bobby Jindal said that he did not think that a 14-year-old should ever get arrested for bringing a clock to school but defended the police who were "worried about security and safety issues".[29] Gawker compared the situation to various other instances of students bringing homemade clocks to school and not receiving any punitive action, as well as incident in 2002 when a student made an inert bomb and carried it to school but was not suspended.[30] An article on Salon described the incident as a part of a school to prison pipeline. It also made comparisons to various instances of white males perpetrating high school shootings.[31]

Biologist-author Richard Dawkins accused Mohamed of staging a hoax by referring to the clock as an invention, writing on Twitter and citing a video and blog by Anthony DiPasquale, an engineer working in IT for a Buffalo newspaper, who wrote in his blog that he believed Mohamed's clock to be a "factory-produced clock" originally made by Radio Shack "that was just taken out of its enclosure, and placed in a pencil box".[32][33][34][35] Dawkins further speculated that Mohamed's intention may have been to get arrested, and said, "If the reassembled components did something more than the original clock, that's creative. If not, it looks like hoax".[35] However, Dawkins also maintained from the beginning that Mohamed should not have been arrested.[36][35][37] Dawkins later said that his concerns stemmed from his impression that Mohamed was claiming to have "invented" the clock, but that "it's possible he doesn't know the meaning of 'invention'".[38] A similar argument was made by Thomas Talbot, an adjunct professor at the University of Southern California,[39] who posted a YouTube video where he discussed a photo of the clock, in which he said Mohamed "never built a clock" but removed the plastic case from a commercial alarm clock and put it into a pencil case.[40]

Techdirt writer Tim Cushing wrote that the Texas "hoax bomb" law Mohamed was accused under was too loosely worded, as a mere reaction by a public safety official was enough to fall under it (regardless of whether he had intentionally meant to do so), and that it could theoretically apply to other legitimate devices (such as phones and road flares) because they can "cause alarm or reaction of any type" from a public safety officer. At the same time, he wrote that the school itself may have also violated the same law, as they presented the clock to police as potentially being an explosive device.[41]

White House press secretary Josh Earnest said that the incident "is a good illustration of how pernicious stereotypes can prevent even good-hearted people who have dedicated their lives to educating young people from doing the good work that they set out to do", and that Ahmed was invited the White House South Lawn for Astronomy Night on October 19.[27][42]

Kevin D. Williamson, a correspondent for the politically conservative magazine National Review, argued that the media was pushing a case for phony Islamophobia, "because it can be used to further a story that the media already want to tell: that the United States is morally corrupt and irredeemably racist; that Muslims are under siege; that white privilege blinds the majority of Americans to the corruption at the heart of everything red, white, and blue", stating we now live in a time of "race-hustling and grievance-mongering." He contrasted the high level of media coverage for the incident with that of a lesser-reported incident involving the arrest of an 8th grader for refusing to remove a National Rifle Association T-shirt in class.[43]

Terri Burke, Executive Director of the ACLU of Texas, stated, "Islamophobia, and probably racism, certainly played a role in Ahmed's ordeal, but the fact is overzealous administrators, zero-tolerance policies, and law enforcement officers ill-equipped to deal with schoolchildren have compromised educational environments throughout the country. [...] Ahmed suffered through a terrifying, traumatizing, and unjust ordeal. Yet because of the mass exposure of what he endured, he's received invitations to the White House, Facebook headquarters, and the Google science fair. [...] For too many others – the ones whose stories won't go viral – the possibility of the American nightmare remains too real."[44]

Fox News Senior Judicial Analyst Andrew Napolitano said that Mohamed and his parents may have committed a "purposeful hoax" by referring to the clock as an invention, and that electronic experts have said the clock looks similar to a 1980s clock sold by Radio Shack.[45][46]

Irving Mayor Beth Van Duyne defended the actions of the police and the Irving Independent School District, stating that they were following the procedure set when a potential threat of criminal act is discovered.[47] Van Duyne, appearing on Glenn Beck's TheBlaze TV, said there was one-sided reporting of the interaction between Mohammed and police, saying that they are unable to release records because Mohammed is a juvenile and his family has refused to allow it. Van Duyne said that from the information she had seen, Mohammed had been "non-responsive" and "passive aggressive" in response to questions from police officers, and that she was shocked when she saw Obama's response, criticizing the President for "second guess[ing] police officers without any kind of information". Van Duyne also said that Irving's police chief and other police officers, as well as teachers and school administrators, were receiving death threats as a result of the controversy.[48]

News commentator Bill Maher said Ahmed deserves an apology but his clock "looks exactly like a fucking bomb", and also suggested that some Muslim adult should say to Mohamed that "maybe one of the reasons why it happened to you is that in our religion we're responsible for 9/11, the Madrid bombing, the London bombing, the Bali discotheque bombings, the Kenya mall...."[49] He furthered, "It's not the color of his skin. ... For the last 30 years, it's been one culture that has been blowing shit up over and over again."[50] On Maher's show, businessman Mark Cuban said that he had a phone conversation with Ahmed, and the boy seemed quite comfortable when talking about tinkering with technology, but when he asked "Tell me what happened because I'm curious?", Cuban could hear Ahmed's sister in the background telling him how to answer.[51]

Mohamed's family response

On September 18, Mohamed Elhassan Mohamed, Ahmed's father, announced that Ahmed will not be returning to MacArthur High School, saying that Ahmed would instead either transfer to a private school or be home-schooled.[52] The family has since withdrawn all of their children from schools in the Irving Independent School District, and the father said the recent events emotionally affected his son, who was not eating well and having trouble sleeping. He said, "It's torn the family and makes us very confused".[53] While many schools have offered to enroll Ahmed, his father said he wants to give the boy some time before making a decision.[53] Mohamed and his family were invited to the headquarters of the United Nations at New York City because some (unnamed) officials from the United Nations wanted to speak with him.[54]

The family hired legal counsel to help them get the clock back from the police.[55] A week after the event, police returned the clock.[56]

See also

References

  1. ^ Chase, Anthony (September 17, 2015). "Reverse Engineering Ahmed Mohamed's Clock… and Ourselves". Artvoice. Khansama Publications, Inc. Retrieved September 24, 2015.
  2. ^ "Irving resident makes his second bid for election as President of Sudan". North Dallas Gazette. Houston. February 23, 2015. Retrieved September 17, 2015.
  3. ^ a b c d e f Selk, Avi (September 15, 2015). "Irving 9th-grader arrested after taking homemade clock to school: 'So you tried to make a bomb?'". The Dallas Morning News. Archived from the original on September 16, 2015. Retrieved September 20, 2015. {{cite news}}: Unknown parameter |deadurl= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)
  4. ^ a b Heller, Corinne (September 16, 2015). "Barack Obama Supports Ahmed Mohamed, 14, Who Brought to School Homemade Clock That Teachers Mistook for Bomb". Eonline. Retrieved September 21, 2015.
  5. ^ "Irving Police Chief Defends Response to Ahmed Mohamed's Clock". NY Times. Retrieved September 20, 2015.
  6. ^ "Ahmed Mohamed's parents serve pizza to a crowd of reporters outside their house". Yahoo News. Retrieved September 20, 2015.
  7. ^ "Muslim teen cuffed over clock mistaken for bomb speaks out". CBS News. Retrieved September 20, 2015.
  8. ^ "Was Ahmed Mohamed arrested because he is Muslim?". Al-Jazeera. Retrieved September 18, 2015.
  9. ^ "Muslim teen Ahmed Mohamed creates clock, shows teachers, gets arrested". CNN. September 16, 2015. Retrieved September 17, 2015.
  10. ^ Abby Philip, Sarah Kaplan (September 16, 2015). "'They thought it was a bomb': 9th-grader arrested after bringing a home-built clock to school". Washington Post. Retrieved September 17, 2015.
  11. ^ O'Malley, Nick (September 17, 2015). "Ahmed Mohamed's handmade clock led to his arrest, then White House invite". Sydney Morning Herald. Washington DC. Retrieved September 17, 2015.
  12. ^ Glenza, J., and Woolf, N., Texas Schoolboy Arrested over Clock to Visit Obama as Authorities Defend Action, The Guardian, September 17, 2015.
  13. ^ Pelletiere, Nicole (September 17, 2015). "Ahmed Mohamed's High School Says He's Welcome Back, But Supports Teacher Who Reported Clock". ABC News. Retrieved September 17, 2015.
  14. ^ "Sec. 46.08. HOAX BOMBS". Texas Constitution and Statutes. Retrieved September 20, 2015.
  15. ^ Wang, Frances (September 16, 2015). "No Charges For Ahmed Mohamed, Teen Arrested After Bringing Homemade Clock to School". NBC News. Retrieved September 17, 2015.
  16. ^ Taranto, James (September 18, 2015). "Stand With Ahmed: But against the 'Islamophobia' myth-makers". Wall Street Journal. Retrieved September 18, 2015.
  17. ^ "The history of anti-Islam controversy in Ahmed Mohamed's Texas city". The Washinton Post. Retrieved September 21, 2015.
  18. ^ McKay, Tom (September 16, 2015). "Texas City Where Ahmed Mohamed Was Arrested Has a Long, Disturbing History of Islamophobia". Mic.com. Retrieved September 17, 2015.
  19. ^ Kaplan, Sarah; Phillip, Abby (September 16, 2015). "Why some Muslims don't want Ahmed Mohamed's blackness to be ignored". Washington Post. Retrieved September 17, 2015.
  20. ^ Vara, Vauhini (September 17, 2015). "How Will Ahmed Mohamned's Story Play Out in Texas". The New Yorker. Retrieved September 20, 2015.
  21. ^ "Handcuffed for Making Clock, Ahmed Mohamed, 14, Wins Time With Obama". New York Times. Houston. September 16, 2015. Retrieved September 17, 2015.
  22. ^ Thomas, Dexter (September 16, 2015). "#IStandWithAhmed lesson: Curiosity is for white kids". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved September 17, 2015.
  23. ^ Vincent, James, Ahmed Mohamed hangs out with Sergey Brin at Google Science Fair, The Verge, 22 September 2015. Retrieved 22 September 2015.
  24. ^ Guynn, Jessica Ahmed Mohamed is VIP at Google Science Fair, 21 September 2015, USA Today. Retrieved 22 September 2015. "Mohamed visited the booths of finalists whose faces lit up when they recognized him. He also mingled with local students visiting the science fair being held on Google's campus in Mountain View, Calif. Exclaimed one student from Oakland, Calif.: 'We learned about you in school!' Mohamed even got to meet Google co-founder Sergey Brin."
  25. ^ Guynn, Jessica (September 17, 2015). "Facebook, Google roll out welcome mat to Ahmed Mohamed". USA Today. San Francisco. Retrieved September 17, 2015.
  26. ^ "Chris Hadfield invites Ahmed Mohamed to Toronto science show". CBCNews. September 16, 2015. Retrieved September 17, 2015.
  27. ^ a b "How student Ahmed Mohamed went from suspected bomb maker to overnight celebrity". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved September 17, 2015.
  28. ^ Kurp, Josh. "'Keep On Keeping On': George Takei Wrote Ahmed Mohamed An Inspiring Note". Uproxx. Retrieved September 17, 2015.
  29. ^ Condon, Stephanie (September 16, 2015). "Early Republican debate turns to Ahmed Mohamed, Kim Davis". CBS News. Retrieved September 17, 2015.
  30. ^ Kush, Andy (September 16, 2015). "7 Kids Not Named Mohamed Who Brought Homemade Clocks to School And Didn't Get Arrested". Gawker. Retrieved September 17, 2015.
  31. ^ Devega, Chauncey (September 23, 2015). "There's one aspect of the Ahmed Mohamed outrage that we aren't talking about nearly enough". Salon (website). Retrieved September 23, 2015.
  32. ^ Ayer, Kavita (September 21, 2015). "Richard Dawkins sparks backlash after questioning Ahmed Mohamed's 'motives'". TechWorm. Retrieved September 22, 2015.
  33. ^ Gell, Aaron (September 21, 2015). "We Talked to the Guy Who Dismantled Ahmed's Clock". Maxim. Retrieved September 22, 2015.
  34. ^ Walsh, Michael (September 20, 2015). "About Mohamed's 'Clock...' Richard Dawkins smells a hoax, gets immediate grief". PJ Media. Retrieved September 22, 2015.
  35. ^ a b c Vale, Richard (September 20, 2015). "Richard Dawkins Accuses Ahmed Mohamed Of Committing 'Fraud'". Huffington Post. Retrieved September 22, 2015.
  36. ^ Dawkins, Richard, "If this is true, what was his motive? Whether or not he wanted the police to arrest him, they shouldn't have done so youtube.com/watch?v=CEmSwJ...", Twitter, 20 September 2015
  37. ^ Chen, Cathaleen, "Was concern over Ahmed Mohamed wholly unjustified? Some critics aren't so sure", Christian Science Monitor/Yahoo! News, 20 September 2015
  38. ^ Gryboski, Michael, "Richard Dawkins Says he now Believes Muslim Bomb Clock Student Ahmed Mohamed", The Christian Post, September 21, 2015.
  39. ^ Talbot, Thomas. "USC Biography". USC Institute for Creative Technologies. Retrieved September 22, 2015.
  40. ^ Hunter, Derek (September 22, 2015). "Professor Calls Ahmed Mohamed's Clock A 'Fraud'". The Daily Caller. Retrieved September 22, 2015.
  41. ^ Cushing, Tim. "Here's The Ridiculous Texas Law That Allows Law Enforcement To Pretend A Digital Clock Is A Hoax Bomb". Techdirt. Retrieved September 17, 2015.
  42. ^ "White House Astronomy Night: A Celebration of Science, Technology, and Space". The White House. Archived from the original on September 17, 2015. Retrieved September 17, 2015.
  43. ^ "Kevin D. Williamson: Ahmed's clock is a phony case of Islamophobia". dallasnews.com.
  44. ^ Burke, Terri. "Let's Assume the Kids (and Ahmed) Are Alright, Not Criminals". The Huffington Post. Retrieved September 19, 2015.
  45. ^ Harris, Julia (September 22, 2015). "Ahmed Mohamed Clock a 'Purposeful Hoax', Potential Fraud Case, Says Judge Napolitano". Latin Post. Retrieved September 22, 2015.
  46. ^ Fox News Insider. "New Twist: Tech Experts Raise Questions About TX Teen's 'Homemade Clock'". Fox News Insider.
  47. ^ Ferner, Matt (September 16, 2015). "Irving Mayor Defends School And Cops, Doesn't Apologize For Arrest Of Muslim Teen Over Clock". Huffington Post. Retrieved September 17, 2015.
  48. ^ Shideler, Kyle. "Irving Mayor: Ahmed Mohamed's Family Blocking Release of Records; Obama Tweeted Support Even Before 'Clock' Pic Released". Town Hall. Retrieved September 23, 2015.
  49. ^ Feldman, Josh, "Maher Battles Guests on Ahmed Mohamed: Be Cautions When Young Muslims Are 'Blowing Sh*t Up'", "Mediaite.
  50. ^ "Bill Maher Does Not Stand With Ahmed Mohamed". Yahoo News. September 20, 2015. Retrieved September 23, 2015.
  51. ^ "Mavericks". dallasnews.com. Retrieved September 23, 2015.
  52. ^ Luckerson, Victor, "Ahmed Mohamed's Dad Says he Won't Return to Public School", September 18, 2015.
  53. ^ a b Ahmed Mohamed withdraws from Texas school that suspended him over clock, 21 September 2015, Associated Press. Retrieved 22 September 2015.
  54. ^ "Ahmed Mohamed withdraws from Texas school that suspended him over clock". The Guardian. Associated Press. September 21, 2015. Retrieved September 22, 2015.
  55. ^ Elizabeth Chuck. "Ahmed Mohamed: Texas Boy's Family Hires Legal Counsel to Get Clock Back". NBC News.
  56. ^ Texas police to Ahmed Mohamed: Pick up your clock
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