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"Clock Boy" Ahmed Mohamed Seeking $15 Million In Damages

Posted by samzenpus on from the paying-the-price dept.

phrackthat writes: The family of Ahmed Mohamed, the boy who was arrested in Irving, Texas has threatened to sue the school and the city of Irving if they do not pay him $15 million as compensation for his arrest. To refresh the memories of everyone, Ahmed's clock was a clock he disassembled then put into a pencil case that looked like a miniature briefcase. He was briefly detained by the Irving city police to interview him and determine if he intended for his clock to be perceived as a fake bomb. He was released to his parents later on that day and they publicized the matter and claimed Ahmed was arrested because of "Islamophobia".

36 of 818 comments (clear)

  1. Litigious Much by slackerfilm · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Ok, I liked Clock Boy but this is just dumb. And $15 million? I sure hope he plans on donating a lot of that to science

    --

    throw the baby out. The bathwater is cold

    1. Re:Litigious Much by rhazz · · Score: 5, Funny

      Suing for such a ridiculous amount just shows that he is truly American.

    2. Re: Litigious Much by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      What did you like about him? His ability to order a clock off the internet, his ability to take it apart, his ability to have his family involved with Cair, perhaps his fathers ability to be involved in failed lawsuits against the city and its manager for the past 2 years, or maybe his ability to get suspended less than 48 hours after being let back in from a previous suspension at a different school?

    3. Re:Litigious Much by hawguy · · Score: 4, Funny

      I say give him and his father the $15M in the form of Hellfire missiles from a Predator drone. Or 3.

      Money well-spent IMO.

      See how fast some other "bright boy" tries that sort of stunt again after *that* sort of "payoff"!

      Strat

      I don't see how that would help, he'd surely get into trouble again if he tried to bring a Hellfire missile to school, even if he has all of the paperwork for it.

    4. Re:Litigious Much by drnb · · Score: 5, Interesting

      If by "science" you mean creationism/intelligent design, Pi=3, genetics is wrong, evolution is a sin, and scientific theories are just "crazy ideas someguy once had that can't be proven"

      You do realize that lots of religious schools, even in Texas, teach evolution even with respect to humans, teach the big bang theory, teach that the discoveries of science are not in conflict with religion, that science and religion search for answers in orthogonal fields.

      FYI, genetic science and the big bang theory began with members of the clergy.

    5. Re:Litigious Much by theArtificial · · Score: 5, Informative

      History of the Big Bang Theory cites a Belgian Catholic Priest named Georges Lemaître as the originator of the theory.

      --
      Man blir trött av att gå och göra ingenting.
    6. Re:Litigious Much by Billy+the+Mountain · · Score: 5, Informative

      For the genetics part see Gregor Johann Mendel https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/.... Mendel was a monk.

      --
      That was the turning point of my life--I went from negative zero to positive zero.
    7. Re:Litigious Much by njnnja · · Score: 5, Informative

      Please excuse the karma whoring but you did ask: Gregor Mendel was a monk who did pioneering experiments on heredity. Although it seems obvious in retrospect, even after Darwin first published the theory of natural selection it wasn't until it was put together with Mendel's work that evolutionary theory as we understand it today came about.

    8. Re:Litigious Much by vel-ex-tech · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Bump.

      To name three things that happened to me off the top of my head:

      1. Accused of criminal hacking (by, you guess it, gaslighting asshole managers^H^H^Hadministrators) and had my computer privileges revoked for a few weeks. Told me I was lucky they didn't have me arrested by the FBI and imprisoned in the big city. I was also lucky my parents didn't believe their version of events.

      That one turned out to be blatant gender discrimination. I later found out they had no problem with what I was doing, as long as it was an empowered young woman doing it.

      Oh, edit: 1.5. After I warned the librarian responsible for the open-use computers that they were infected with a virus, I was given a stern warning and told I may have broken the acceptable use policy.

      2. Accused of plagiarism because obviously a however year old I was at the time couldn't possibly program something in Pascal. They were never quite able to figure out what and who I plagiarized.

      3. Had a calculator game I'd put perhaps 3 or 4 weeks of work into erased after leaving my calculator unattended. That was definitely a lesson in keeping backups! (As in I didn't have a single backup anywhere.) That one almost escalated to a lawsuit, but to her credit, the teacher that did it became apologetic once she realized what she had actually done.

      On the other hand, I was never actually arrested.

      On the other, other hand, my motives were authentic unlike "Clock Boy," who seems to have had questionable motives. I also learned that computers are magical palantirs into cyberspace powered by waldos and that any display of talent on my part would get me labeled a dangerous criminal hacker.

      On the 3rd other hand, at a different school, my talent got me a summer and after school job. I'm certain I must have been a misogynerd who prevented a more talented woman from being offered that job. (I wouldn't be surprised if that was the case, since my specialty is software development and the only woman in the class specialized in hardware and network, which would have been more relevant to the job.)

    9. Re:Litigious Much by drnb · · Score: 4, Informative

      You could also say "The big bang theory began with the Belgian Army", because he was also in that.

      He was no longer in the Army. However he was teaching at a Catholic university at the time.

    10. Re:Litigious Much by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      #whitelivesdontmatter

    11. Re:Litigious Much by drnb · · Score: 5, Insightful

      He was not doing cosmological research when in the army, however he was doing cosmological research as a priest and a professor at a catholic university. Research done with the full knowledge and support of his church, including some funding. A church that fully embraced his discovery. A church that continues to participate in and support serious cosmological research.

    12. Re: Litigious Much by Noah+Haders · · Score: 4, Informative

      No, people admired that he built a clock, when in fact he just took apart a working clock to make a shitty clock that looked like a bomb, then took it to school to "show people."

    13. Re:Litigious Much by hairyfeet · · Score: 4, Insightful

      You DO realize that he's moving to Qatar right? The worst school in America isn't gonna be as religiously batshit and backasswards as a country under Sharia.

      --
      ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
    14. Re: Litigious Much by jasno · · Score: 4, Interesting

      A few of us current engineers got started as kids doing stupid things that only resembled real engineering. I used to spend my allowance at radio shack buying random components only to hook them up to a 9v battery and a metal file to make sparks.

      Take away the backstory about how his dad probably used the kid for politics and political gain, and take away the family's scary religion, and you have a guy a lot of us would sympathize with. We were weird kids who did stupid things and scared people.

      I guess if I sat around listening to the right wing shitstorm over the issue I might feel differently. As much as I am appalled at the family's lawsuit and monetary demands, I have to admit that they did a good job trolling a bunch of stupid school administrators and small town law enforcement. The over reaction of the school and cops opened them up to this. Seriously... interrogating a kid without his parents? I remember when they tried that shit on me.

      --

      http://www.masturbateforpeace.com/
    15. Re: Litigious Much by Sun · · Score: 4, Insightful

      That's because people are ignorant.

      The learning process starts where he did. Take something apart, try to put it together. Hailing him as a genius was being carried away, but labelling him a terrorist was even worse. This is how children learn. It's how we want children to learn.

      Anyone who expects a child that has never learned proper electronics to build an electronic clock from scratch on first attempt is simply ignorant.

      Shachar

  2. That won't last long... by Penguinisto · · Score: 5, Interesting

    The school certainly overreacted, but...

    1) the kid was not arrested, nor did he suffer any "damages" in light of the celebrity and overly-friendly treatment from the President, and
    2) once the jury hears about his overly-activist father and the lawyer's insinuation that the whole thing was a set-up?

    I'm not seeing this one going very far.

    --
    Quo usque tandem abutere, Nimbus, patientia nostra?
    1. Re:That won't last long... by slimdave · · Score: 5, Informative

      ... the kid was not arrested ...

      Purely on a factual level, yes he was arrested, after being questioned for an hour and a half (how is that even possible?), and was taken to a detention centre, fingerprinted, photographed, and questioned further.

      He was not charged. Possibly that's what you meant.

    2. Re:That won't last long... by hawguy · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Um, the majority of nerds I knew growing up had the same exact issue. The only difference is none sued.

      They same exact issue? They were questioned for 90 minutes, accused of making a hoax bomb, then taken away in handcuffed to be processed at the police station? Are you *sure* it was the same?

    3. Re:That won't last long... by PRMan · · Score: 5, Informative

      He actually was invited to visit the fair—which he declined—and Olivia's ebola test won first prize.

      --
      Peter predicted that you would "deliberately forget" creation 2000 years ago...
  3. Integrated very well by Brama · · Score: 5, Insightful

    How much more American can you get?

    1. Re:Integrated very well by andymadigan · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Well, he's moving to Qatar, so apparently he doesn't like the idea of being American anymore. I can't blame him for that, but I have no sympathy for someone who complains their civil rights have been violated and then moves to a country that still practices slavery.

      He shouldn't get a cent.

      --
      The right to protest the State is more sacred than the State.
  4. Fantastic way to lose all sympathy by 140Mandak262Jamuna · · Score: 5, Insightful

    No way the school district is going to pay 15 mill to this family that has already emigrated to Qatar. It will probably cost a few thousands in lawyer fees. On the other hand, that clock boy is going to lose all sympathy from most people. It lends credence to the accusation that the boy's father, a presidential candidate in south sudan or chad or some such place is quite media savvy and has manipulated the media and gamed the system.

    --
    sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
  5. Lawyers by ardmhacha · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I am sure that this is all his own idea and no lawyers were involved in the decision to sue for $15 million.

  6. Dad of Ahmed is an Islamic Supremacist by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Mohamed Elhassan Mohamed and Robert Spencer once debated on the topic, “Does Islam Respect Human Rights?” The results were so bad for him that after the debate, The American Muslim pleaded with Muslims not to debate Spencer. In any case, this debate is one indication that Mohamed Elhassan has been trying for several years to make his bones as a warrior against “Islamophobia.”

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N8BLtBFeyyo

    The debate starts at 31:48, after an interview with Walid Phares. On a separate note, this Sudanese Islamic activist once claimed that that incident would “spread Islam” in America

    That kid may have been innocent, but his father is an Islamic activist trying to intimidate anyone who has any concerns about Islamic activism.

  7. Yes, he was arrested [Re:That won't last long...] by Geoffrey.landis · · Score: 5, Informative

    The school certainly overreacted, but...

    1) the kid was not arrested

    Yes, he was. He was taken away from the school by the police in handcuffs. That's an arrest.

    I think what you meant to say was, the kid was not charged. That's correct. He was arrested, but released without charges.

    --
    http://www.geoffreylandis.com
  8. Step to the right direction by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Perhaps this case will be dismissed or jury will decide not to award damages.

    However this will be an example. There was a story recently where two arab speaking US citizens were not admitted to the plane, because somebody feared.

    http://news.yahoo.com/two-men-kept-boarding-us-plane-speaking-arabic-023330187.html

    These two fellow American,s US citizens would have been better off recording the encounter, missing the plane and then suing for bona fide discrimination and would have won big time.

    This paranoia needs to stop and one or two cases with proper settlements would help.

  9. What is the option by sjames · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Yes, suing a school just de-funds the school, but what is the option? How else can you force the school to come to terms with the fact that it's principal is a braying ass? You're not allowed to sue a school to force it to re-train or replace a bad teacher or administrator.

  10. Re:WHERE CAN I CHECK MY WHITE PRIVILEGE?!? by swb · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I keep trying to play on the relentless oppression of my German people since the Roman empire and how this is a crime that hasn't been addressed and has been repeated over the centuries, from the 100 years war, the Napoleonic wars, the anti-German discrimination against German Americans during and after WW I, the internment of Germans during WW II.

    My people are being picked on, and it's been going on FOR MILLENNIA and I deserve a check in the mail.

  11. gone and stay gone by harvey+the+nerd · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The kid and his dad are provocateurs who deliberately baited the school teachers. Dad's sounds like he's been wanting to leave for a long time, probably spent his time dreaming this s**t up. They get nothing and need their visas pulled as undesirable aliens.

  12. Sympathy only goes so far. by MAXOMENOS · · Score: 4, Insightful

    The school district acted inappropriately. A written apology is warranted. But even I want to tell the kid's family to GTFO at that price tag.

    --
    Finding God in a Dog
  13. Cool ransom note Ahmed by JoeyRox · · Score: 4, Funny

    Want to bring it to the White House?

  14. Bullshit. by khasim · · Score: 4, Informative

    Assuming there was not communication among the staff that knew it was just a stupid clock to those other people, I can see who it would meet a standard of 'reasonable suspicion' to justify an arrest.

    Of course you do. But that's only because almost every person believes that THEIR opinion is a "reasonable" one.

    I remember back in the day (I'm old) when a student would bring something distracting to school the teacher would confiscate it and the student collect it at the end of the day.

    At worst, a student's parents would be called in.

    But students were never arrested for bringing toys to school. That's just stupid.

  15. Venom by ichthus · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Who is responsible for my fear of snakes? Venomous snakes.
    Who is responsible for my Islamophobia? Jihadists/Islamic "extremists"/Islamic terrorists.
    If Muslims want to decry rampant Islamophobia, they should stop being the assholes of planet Earth.

    --
    sig: sauer
  16. Scientific method was also promoted by clergy by drnb · · Score: 5, Insightful

    What, PRECISELY does him being a Monk have to do with religion not being antithetical to science? Because science means questioning (and looking for the answers in evidence, IOW "that which is seen"), ...

    Yeah, the scientific method, guess what ... in Europe various members of the clergy were partly responsible for its widespread adoption. A bishop in London comes to mind, don't recall the name. Sorry, most Christian denominations don't see science and religion as being in conflict, they study orthogonal topics. These religions specifically state that the discoveries of science, the observations of the workings of nature, are not in conflict with faith.

  17. Okay now I give up by chispito · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I defended this kid before, thinking that it sucks to get misunderstood and just because his dad is an obnoxious pot stirring lawyer doesn't mean the kid had anything to do with it but this is just stupid. I hope they get counter sued and lose hard.

    --
    The Daddy casts sleep on the Baby. The Baby resists!