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Unable To Hack Into Grading System, Georgia Student Torches Computer Lab

Posted by timothy on from the our-son dept.

McGruber writes: A 15 year-old Douglas County, Georgia high school student has been charged with five felonies, including burglary and arson, after sheriff's deputies caught him while responding to a 1 AM fire at Alexander High School. The boy admitted to investigators that he set fire to a computer after trying, unsuccessfully, to hack into the school computer system to change his grade on a failed test. "It's very sad and tragic. He could have very easily come to one of his counselors and asked for help," said Lt. Glenn Daniel with the Douglas County Sheriff's Department. "From what we can tell, (the student) was mad and frustrated because he could not hack into the system." Lt. Daniel said the charges could land the young man in prison for several years. The computer lab was cleaned up and re-opened in time for the start of that day's classes.

5 of 246 comments (clear)

  1. Hahah by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Interesting

    You gonna destroy the childs life because of a stupid mistake a child would make....

    1. Re:Hahah by smittyoneeach · · Score: 2, Interesting

      We must always prefer drugs and state intervention to failed approaches like, you know, parenting and involvement in a community of faith.

      --
      Get thee glass eyes, and, like a scurvy politician, seem to see things thou dost not.--King Lear
    2. Re:Hahah by cptdondo · · Score: 4, Interesting

      So presumably you're willing to pay the $400,000 or so it will cost to keep him in jail "for several years" plus the inevitable public aid, unemployment benefits, food stamps, etc for the rest of his life?

      Or would you rather pay a few thousand for counseling and public service monitoring?

      Fuck your "lock 'em up" mindset. We already incarcerate more people in this country than any other civilized nation, and it serves no purpose whatsoever other than to fuck up peoples' lives and costs us, the taxpayers, millions of dollars.

      But that's what we get when we make the justice system a for-profit operation.

  2. One word: Cloud by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Better question: What kind of kid who at least *thinks* he might be capable of hacking the school's system wouldnt be aware of cloud storage/backup? Clearly setting a fire would do nothing to cloud stored data.

  3. Apparently not by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    If you he have easily asked for help from a counselor, then he wouldn't have tried to hack into the computers and then torch the place.

    Clearly, this kid is mentally unstable. However, it is also clear that the counselors did not present a viable alternative to extreme violence.