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

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".

21 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 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.

    4. 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.
    5. 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.
    6. 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.

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

      #whitelivesdontmatter

    8. 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.

  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?

  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.

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    sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
  5. 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.

  6. 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.

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    http://www.geoffreylandis.com
  7. 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.

  8. 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.

  9. 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.

  10. 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.