Nick Emmett's satirical, unofficial high school Web site got laughs for its mock obituaries, including one of a friend dying of a sexually transmitted disease. In fact, people asked him to make them his next "victims." But in light of school shootings around the country, the site got him suspended after a sensationalized television news story about the mock obituaries. But Emmett has received a big break from a federal judge, who has handed down a temporary restraining order stopping the Kent, Washington school from punishing his free speech rights.
A Feb. 16 news story on local television led to Nick Emmitt's suspension from Kentlake High School by principal Dick Campbell. But U.S. District Court Chief Judge John Coughenour has ruled Emmitt's Web site about Kentlake involved no legitimate threats to anyone's safety, student or staff. Thus, Coughenour ruled, the school had no authority to punish even if its principal suggested alarm in the wake of Colorado and other school shootings meant acting on the side of safety.
Emmett's online comments and remarks were "not at a school assembly… not in a school-sponsored newspaper…(and) not produced in connection with any class or school project," the judge ruled. "Although the intended audience was undoubtedly connected to Kentlake High School, the speech was entirely outside of the school's supervision or control."
There is another hearing set for March 16, with both sides trying to work out a settlement in the case. Coughenour's ruling included a conclusion that Emmett was likely to win the case on its merits.
The 18-year-old senior had created the Web site, "Unofficial Kentlake High School Home Page," outside school hours on his home computer. The site featured, among other things, mock obituaries of some of his fellow students, and caused an uproar over its mock poll soliciting votes on who would die next, and a photograph of Kentlake principal Dick Campbell with the poll, captioned, "I wanna die. Pick me! Pick me!"
"All the names on the ballot were friends or acquaintances of Nick's who asked to be listed as candidates for the next victim of an unlikely and humorous death," said American Civil Liberties Union attorney Aaron Caplan, in a brief calling for the temporary restraining order. "Those listed considered it to be fun, or even a compliment."
That is, until a local television station broadcast a somewhat sensationalized story about the flap, which Emmett - in his own brief filed through the ACLU - said caused him to fear the school might overreact to the Web site. And he had good reason: the television news report said, erroneously, that the site had a hit list of people to be killed. Emmett took the site down right away, only to go to school the next day, visit Campbell's office, and learn he would be disciplined - eventually, a five-day suspension.
Campbell told the New York Times he disciplined the senior because the Web site was "intimidating and harassing" to students and staff and created a disruption. "Multiple classrooms were taken off task and [the site] became a focus of student activity," he told the Times.
Caplan accused the school of overreacting, as Emmett had feared they might, but Campbell told the Times that if he overreacted, it was on the side of student safety. Had the temporary restraining order been rejected, Caplan said in his motion, Emmett would have missed four more days of school, including playoff games of the school basketball team he captains, and risked "endangering" college plans. "And," Caplan continued, "he will endure unconstitutional punishment for the exercise of his free speech rights, which constitutes irreparable harm in itself."
Emmett was described as a serious student who loved school and held down a high grade-point average in advanced placement classes, with no prior history of school discipline, according to the Caplan brief.
The Web site, in fact, included disclaimers saying it was not a school-sponsored site and aimed at entertainment purposes alone, the brief continues. "It nowhere advocated violence, criminal conduct, or even disrespect for authority," Caplan said. "To the contrary, Nick's considerable school spirit led him to write and post compliments to the school administration on the web site, and to refrain from posting criticism of them."
Caplain said Emmett got the idea for the spoof obituaries from a friend with whom he took a creative writing class which included writing their own obituaries as a class exercise. "Specifically," Caplan continued, "(the friend) suggested that there be an obituary for him that claimed he died of a sexually transmitted disease. The resulting parody may not be to everyone's taste, but was written in typical high school humor."
Caplain posted the mock obit as well as a second saying another friend died of a "vicious dare in Gym class." He also said when the Web site became known around the student body, Emmett got requests from students asking if they could be the next obituary victims, and that even some of the school faculty enjoyed the gag. In fact, Caplain said, Emmett consulted with Kentlake Assistant Principal Dan Heltsley the day before the television news report which spooked so many, asking Heltsley if anything on the site was objectionable. "Mr. Heltsley said he had no objection to the web site, and that he would let Nick know if any objections developed," Caplain said, adding Heltsley later kidded around that Emmett's "dead" friend "might…be barred from Friday's basketball game because dead people weren't allowed."
The demand for fake obituaries moved Emmett to post the mock poll. But then came the television news report, which apparently struck at lingering feelings of alarm in the wake of the Columbine High School shootings - though this was well before a Michigan six-year-old boy shot a first-grade classmate to death.
Coughenour ruled the school showed no evidence any student felt threatened by Emmett's Web site despite saying so during oral arguments in the case. "The defendant has presented no evidence to suggest that the plaintiff intended to intimidate or threaten anyone," the judge wrote. Citing Supreme Court and other legal precedent, he ruled the school could not abrogate Emmett's First Amendment rights unless it proved there had been any disruption caused
"The defendant argues, persuasively, that school administrators are in an acutely difficult position after recent school shootings in Colorado, Oregon, and other places," Coughenour continued. "Web sites can be an early indication of a student's violent inclinations, and can spread those beliefs quickly to like-minded or susceptible people. The defendant, however, has presented no evidence that the mock obituaries and voting on this web site were intended to threaten anyone, did actually threaten anyone, or manifested any violent tendencies whatsoever."
