Group of fourth-grade girls planned to kill their teacher with hand sanitizer, police say

[Omaha Steve]

Source: WJLA

ELBA, N.Y. (WKBW/WJLA) – Deputies with the Genesee County Sheriff's Office say a group of fourth graders planned to kill their teacher at Elba Elementary School.

According to the incident report, the Elba Elementary School principal called authorities after discovering a plot to harm the teacher.

Three students, all girls, are accused of planning to put hand sanitizer on different items the teacher would touch. That teacher is highly allergic to hand sanitizer, and police say the students knew this would hurt the teacher.

Sheriff's deputies and other officials met with the children accused of the plot and their parents. At least one parent said the children knew the teacher could become very sick from contact with hand sanitizer, according to the incident report.

FULL story at link.



Elba Elementary School. (Photo: WKBW)

Read more: http://www.wjla.com/articles/2015/01/group-of-fourth-grade-girls-planned-to-kill-their-teacher-with-hand-sanitizer-police-say-110471.html

[NYC_SKP]

1. Good grief!

Props to the one parent who contacted the school.

The others who knew but did nothing, well, I just don't know.

[SummerSnow]

2. wow just wow

[olddots]

3. I have a hard time believing kids could come up with this plot

Without being prompted by some outside influence ...but jeez who knows what evil lurks out there ?

[eggplant]

4. No, this sounds just like something kids would come up with

I would have a hard time believing that the teacher's allergy was somehow a secret (why would it be), and hand sanitizer is readily available in elementary schools. It would have been easy to do, and would likely have been effective.

I'm just glad they were stopped in time.

[onecaliberal]

5. I completely believe these kids came up

With this on their own, some little girls are so mean it's ridiculous.

[AwakeAtLast]

16. Boys can be just as vicious

It is not only found in one gender.

[Android3.14]

12. Spend three minutes in a school cafeteria

The experience will alleviate that pesky naivete.

[mackerel]

6. I hope those girls get the therapy they need and are kept separated from

each other.

[oberliner]

7. You can't kill someone by "putting hand sanitizer on different items"

This was just a bunch of 9 year olds saying silly stuff.

A non-story to get some folks to watch the local news and generate some website hits.

[AwakeAtLast]

17. You can if that person is highly allergic

As the story says.

It's like putting peanut butter on an item of a person who has a peanut allergy.

They deliberately chose something that they knew would harm the teacher.

[oberliner]

25. No you can't

And no it's not like doing that.

The worst thing that can happen to someone who is highly allergic to hand sanitizer is that they will get a rash or hives.

[Yo_Mama]

32. No, that's not true. There are contact allergies so severe that they cause anaphylactic reactions.

Plus, if you have hand sanitizer on your hands and eat something like an apple or rub your eyes, the result is going to be most unfortunate.

I'm sure the pupils were informed, and nowadays pupils in many elementary schools get early training in allergies due to more common peanut allergies.

[oberliner]

37. Yes, it is true

There has never been a case of someone being killed by exposure to hand sanitizer.

If you have evidence to the contrary, please provide it and I will withdraw my assertion.

[Yo_Mama]

45. There's an FDA report on hand sanitizer suspected to have caused anaphylactic shock

http://factmed.com/study-QUIK-CARE%20MOISTURIZING%20GEL%20WATERLESS%20ANTIMICROBIAL%20HAND%20SANITIZER%20ETHY-causing-ANAPHYLACTIC%20SHOCK.php

Anything could cause anaphylaxis

You really have to search for the chemical names. Take the chlorhexidines - they are known to produce acute allergic reactions in an unfortunate few:
http://www.invisicare.com/hand_sanitizers.html
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1881536/
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1881536/
http://www.drugs.com/sfx/chlorhexidine-topical-side-effects.html

I'm not going any further, but I think you should rethink your profound certainty on this issue, because take something like OPA, which is often used commercially as a sanitizer, but is widely reported to be an issue for increasing numbers of HCW and patients:
http://www.aaaai.org/ask-the-expert/anaphylactic-reactions-to-Cidex-opa.aspx

More and more schools are being informed of severe hand sanitizer allergies:
http://noll.bhncdsb.ca/files/Allergy_LEtter.pdf

I would hazard a guess that the combination of ingredients in many hand sanitizer produces cross reactions that then generate the acute chemical allergy. People who tend to have allergies should avoid hand sanitizers in the first place. With chemicals, the rule is that if you don't have to, you shouldn't.

[oberliner]

46. There has not been any cases of a person being killed by hand sanitizer

I certainly agree that people with allergies should avoid them, but I do not believe that there was any scenario where these students could have been capable of killing this teacher by "putting hand sanitizer on things".

I would also argue that lots and lots and lots of kids idly talk about killing their teacher. If students think a teacher is mean and the teacher is allergic to something, I cannot imagine that there isn't some point that some group of his/her students discuss the idea of covering the classroom with said allergen, but don't actually do it.

There is an entire canon of rhymes and songs dedicated to students imagining killing their teacher.

This incident to me is a non-story that was utilized to sell newspaper and generate clicks.

[joeglow3]

50. Just because something is normalized we should ignore it?

I can think of many instances in history where I am glad that was not the prevailing attitude.

[oberliner]

53. No, we shouldn't

They should be spoken to by a school administrator, such as a principal.

I do not see this as a job for law enforcement, and I do not think these kids need any kind of therapy strictly because of this.

My actual point, though, was that the news outlets have taken a common everyday occurrence (kids saying mean things about a teacher they don't like) and blown it up into something it isn't in order to generate attention for themselves.

Remember that no actual hand sanitizer was placed anywhere by these kids. They just talked/joked about doing so.

And even if they did put hand sanitizer on things, it seems like the school can handle the discipline for that.

[Art_from_Ark]

63. "There is an entire canon of rhymes and songs dedicated to students imagining killing their teacher"

Back in the '60s, my brother said that the kids in his class used to sing a song set to the music of The Battle Hymn of the Republic: "Glory, glory, hallelujah, teacher hit me with a ruler..." and it got much worse after that. Of course, nothing happened, it was just kids letting off steam. These days, though, they might have been turned in to the police

[oberliner]

64. "Mine Eyes Have Seen the Glory of the Burning of the School..."

I remember it well.

[Art_from_Ark]

65. That was it

The lyrics were pretty vicious.

[KittyWampus]

73. let's get past the "it wouldn't have killed her" part and to the FACT the kids knowingly

were plotting to harm their teacher doing something they knew would harm her.

[oberliner]

76. No they weren't

They were ten-year olds talking about something they had no intention of actually doing and something that they took no steps to actually do.

[LisaL]

41. Ever heard of allergies?

I can eat a whole container of peanut butter and not get sick. Somebody with severe allergies could be dead from a very small amount.
This teacher was allergic to hand sanitizer.

[oberliner]

42. Yes, I have

But you cannot kill someone by exposing them to hand sanitizer no matter how severe their allergy might be. It is not the same as a peanut allergy.

If you can provide evidence of someone being killed by exposure to hand sanitizer, please do so and I will withdraw my assertion.

[LisaL]

55. An allergy is an allergy.

"Although details on how severe the teacher's allergy to hand sanitizer is, experts say that an allergic reaction is similar to an allergy to peanuts which could cause swelling in the airway and suffocation leading to death."

http://www.techtimes.com/articles/25896/20150112/dirty-plan-new-york-fourth-graders-plotted-to-kill-teacher-using-hand-sanitizer.htm

[oberliner]

56. Maybe a teacher needs to look at the sentence

It makes no sense. Specifically the clause before the comma:

"Although details on how severe the teacher's allergy to hand sanitizer is,"

There's at least a word or two missing.

And the whole "experts say" thing is something that should be beyond a reputable journalist.

In any case, no one has ever been killed by kids putting hand sanitizers on things. And this woman would not have been killed had the kids done so. And the kids didn't actually do anything.

May I direct you to this quote:

"When we realized they never followed through with it and they told us they had no intention of following through, we said there was not much we can do."

[NanceGreggs]

61. If the teacher's allergy ...

... is severe enough to cause serious illness or even death, she would be wearing protective gloves at all times.

Otherwise, she would be at risk by simply shaking someone's hand, handling an object that had just been handled by someone who recently used sanitizer, eating at any restaurant or cafeteria where food prep personnel use sanitizer - indeed, touching anything that might contain residue of recently-applied sanitizer, such as doorknobs, hold-poles on a train or bus, books or magazines, flatware and dishware in a restaurant, items on any store shelf, etc.

If this teacher doesn't wear protective gloves at all times outside of her own home, she would come into contact with hand sanitizer residue at least dozens, if not hundreds of times every day of her life from sources too numerous to be mentioned.

So much for the theory that her allergy is severe enough to cause serious illness, no less death.

[LisaL]

67. How do you know what she does or doesn't wear?

[NanceGreggs]

81. I don't.

But if her allergy is severe enough so that any contact with sanitizer would cause a serious reaction, she would have to wear gloves to avoid said contact. And if she does wear gloves, there would be no point in putting sanitizer on things she might touch, would there?

[KittyWampus]

74. True, but the kids were still intentionally planning on harming their teacher.

Whether it would have actually killed her is -almost- besides the point.

It seems to indicate some sadistic tendencies which might indicate some sort of intervention.

[NanceGreggs]

83. Fer fuck's sake ...

THEY'RE KIDS!

When I was in grade school, we talked about "killing" our teachers, "killing" our parents, "killing" other kids we didn't like.

KIDS talk that way. Adults who take such talk seriously should re-evaluate their own maturity - or lack thereof.

[DeSwiss]

8. So far we have the.....

...who, what, when and how.

- But not the why. And we won't since they're juveys.

K&R


''There are two ways: with nature or against nature. You have to choose one.'' ~Hisao Hanafusa

[marble falls]

13. My thought, too. I think the teacher requires a little looking at, also. Something seems a little...

hinkydink.

[davidpdx]

15. Looking at how?

Even if the teacher was abusive (and we don't know for sure), students getting together to try to kill the teacher was not the way it should have been handled. What next, students bringing guns to school? Oh, yeah that already happens.

I had abusive teachers in school. It didn't mean I wanted to kill them.

If students at that age are into that sort of acts, it makes me wonder where they are heading.

They are little psychopaths.

[marble falls]

21. What the kids did was way out of line. But they are 9 yrs old. I really want to know what happened..

to make three nine year old girls think they needed to do something about this teacher. Thats all I'm saying.

You question me for wanting to know more about the teacher, and you casually toss out "psychopaths" at the children. At least one of them discussed it with a parent who reported it to the police. Talking about it with a parent doesn't sound psychopathic. It suggests to me an ongoing and discussed problem with a teacher.

[davidpdx]

29. It could be that one was pressured in to it by the others and had the good sense to

tell a parent because she was scared shitless. In that case, good for her. It is possible not all three had a vendetta against the teacher. We don't know.

Planning to murder someone is a crime whether you are 9 or 100. Granted it probably would have failed unless the teacher's allergic reaction was extreme.

I'm not convinced the teacher was the problem.

[Yo_Mama]

33. At that age they aren't - they tend not to grasp the seriousness.

On the other hand, it can't be ignored either.

[treestar]

19. Victim blaming eom

[marble falls]

23. No victim blaiming here. Just a little look at the whole picture before we hang anybody 9yrs old....

maybe air the whole thing out first?

[davidpdx]

31. Oh come on, they aren't going to be hung

They'll get counseling and a slap on the wrist. Stop being melodramatic.

[marble falls]

34. That's why the Sheriffs gotten involved. Who said hung? You did. Slap on the wrist? I doubt it....

Take a look at the juvenile justice industry.

Edit: I said hung. But not in the punishment sense, in the sense that we shouldn't condemn before the a fair hearing of all the factsl.

[davidpdx]

51. No, you said it

Post 23:

No victim blaiming here. Just a little look at the whole picture before we hang anybody 9yrs old....

[Yo_Mama]

35. It's a school disciplinary matter, since the actual act did not occur.

That's what the article says, anyway.

And yeah, they do need some education.

[AwakeAtLast]

20. Wow

No teacher deserves this kind of treatment.

[marble falls]

24. No teacher deserves this kind of treatment. And no nine year old child deserves contact with....

the justice system without fair hearing and a presentation of all the facts. How about waiting at least until someone asks them a simple, "Why"?

[AwakeAtLast]

30. They were trying to harm another person

With a deliberate act. They should have contact with the justice system to make sure they do not do this to someone else.

[marble falls]

36. Again, wouldn't you like to know why?

[AwakeAtLast]

48. As much as I would like to know why anyone harms another

What if they had intended to do this with a knife? They were showing intent to seriously harm someone.

What if it was another student?

[oberliner]

38. They are nine years old

Their brains are not fully formed. They are little kids. They think their teacher is mean. They want something bad to happen to said teacher. They should be called to the principal's office and told that talking about harming another person is wrong. Lesson learned.This is not something that the justice system needs to address.

[treestar]

44. that's not just hitting another kid

It is not typical kid stuff. I think if this story is true the kids are disturbed. What goes on at home should be investigated.

[AwakeAtLast]

47. Thank you

I agree.

[oberliner]

57. Could not disagree more strongly

I think it is exactly typical kid stuff and the kids are by no means disturbed.

Kids say mean things about teachers they don't like. Young kid without a fully formed brain thinks: teacher is mean - I don't like her, I want something bad to happen to her - she hates hand sanitizer - lets cover everything in it - hopefully she'll die - then we won't have to deal with her anymore. Then they talk about it with their friends. Then they don't do anything.

May I direct you to this quote:

"When we realized they never followed through with it and they told us they had no intention of following through, we said there was not much we can do."

[KittyWampus]

75. sadistic behavior is not, or at least SHOULD NOT, be normal.

[oberliner]

77. There was no sadistic behavior

In fact, there was no behavior of any kind. Just little kids talking. There are songs, rhymes, children's books, movies all devoted to the fantasy of kids getting revenge on a mean teacher. Please remember that these children did not actually do anything other than talk.

[oberliner]

39. What kind of treatment?

Nobody actually did anything.

Students talk crap about teachers all the time.

[Renew Deal]

28. Because she's "so mean"

Obviously

[ripcord]

9. This sort of thing is just chilling

[oberliner]

26. Are you serious?

Chilling?

[JonLP24]

10. In Kuwait

or any military base over there alcohol isn't easy to come by but expensive when you find it. It is outlawed and it is almost always acquired from a TCN (unless they had family mail it to them, once drank liquor from a peroxide bottle). Anyways, some of it was real nasty that some of us thought the real nasty stuff was made with hand sanitizer (which is everywhere at Arif Jan). Had the smell, look, feel and tasted what it smells like

[Chemisse]

11. You can tell it was the idea of 9 year olds

Since the teacher would simply have been afflicted with a rash on contact.

It would be silly, except their intention to kill the teacher is very chilling. How could they think that was okay?

[happyslug]

14. I went to schools in the 1960s, what would they have done with me and my Friends???

I learned this ditty from my older sisters, who had learned it from older kids (Sang to the tune of the Battle Hymn of the Republic), we sang it as we walked to school each day:

Glory, Glory Hallelujah
Teacher hit me with a ruler
I hit her back with a rotten Tangerine
We kids are marching on

Would that song get me suspended today?

Sorry, making the teacher sick do to a reaction to sanitation lotion may be mean, but is it an act of terrorism? Is it something to release to the Public? In my High School we had a bomb go off and they did not even close the school and NEVER told the papers. I am shocked that TALK from Fourth Graders on how to make their teacher SICK should be released to the press. This is something that should stay "in house" i.e. teacher warned, the Students "Disciplined" but some verbal remand and then leave the whole thing die. My objection is why was this released to the press?? I suspect School Politics, but how and why we will never know.

[treestar]

22. That's a song

They were planning something.

And it's a good thing that we learn there are kids with such desires; their names are not released.

[oberliner]

27. What they were planning was "putting hand sanitizer on things"

And they just talked about it - didn't actually do anything. And they are in 4th grade.

[treestar]

43. But they intended to harm someone else

[oberliner]

58. And the principal should tell them what they thought of doing was wrong

And that if they do bring in hand sanitizer they will be in big trouble.

[treestar]

66. Doing something to someone else that you know will make them sick

Is pretty big. More than disciplinary. I'd make sure they got counseling. Kids may strike each other impulsively, but to plan to hurt an adult seems a bit much. I'd see what was going on at home. That's rather evil for a kid.

[oberliner]

68. Evil?

I can't believe that you really think this. I honestly am not sure if you are meaning this as parody or are serious.

[treestar]

69. You don't think it's evil to plan to make someone else sick?

Egads.

I was not a mean kid. I was the one others were occasionally mean to. But nothing like this.

How would you feel if someone deliberately plotted to make you ill?

Your reaction to this as simple kid stuff appalls me. Did you do something like this to someone else when you were a child?

[oberliner]

70. Kids talk like this about teachers they think are mean

As I wrote to another poster on this thread:

If students think a teacher is mean and the teacher is allergic to something, I cannot imagine that there isn't some point that some group of his/her students discuss the idea of covering the classroom with said allergen, but don't actually do it.

There is an entire canon of rhymes and songs dedicated to students imagining killing their teacher.

I would also direct you to this quote from the article:

"When we realized they never followed through with it and they told us they had no intention of following through, we said there was not much we can do."

[treestar]

71. I thought a few teachers were mean

Never ever would have thought of doing them harm.

If they did not intend to actually do it, that's different, though. But again, I wouldn't have ever thought up such a thing.

[oberliner]

72. OK fair enough

We're not going to agree on this, but I appreciate the exchange of perspectives. I did not mean to insult you when I wrote that I wasn't sure if it was parody - sometimes you never know when people are being serious or being sarcastic.

In any case, I stand by my claim that the newspapers blew this out of proportion in order to generate clicks. That was really the primary point I wanted to make.

[oberliner]

40. Totally agree with you here

The whole thing is preposterous and clearly designed to get attention/clicks.

[Tom Ripley]

18. I see careers in the CIA in their future

[BadGimp]

49. Good luck finding a sub

[SheilaT]

52. I'm of the opinion that the chemical hand sanitizers are

A Very Bad Idea in the first place. Ordinary soap and water is better.

It's hard to be certain exactly how serious those little girls were, but they probably could use a little counseling. And maybe some monitoring of what the read and watch.

[NanceGreggs]

54. How does ...

"the children knew the teacher could become very sick from contact with hand sanitizer." translate to "they planned to KILL their teacher"?

Given their ages, these girls probably figured the teacher would "become very sick" in terms they think of as "sick", i.e. vomiting, stomach cramps, diarrhea, etc.

To say they planned to "kill their teacher" is too ludicrous for words.

[oberliner]

59. Very well said

Been trying to make that same point on this thread.

[NanceGreggs]

60. I know.

I also know how impossible it is to make a rational point to people who think that three nine-year-olds talking about doing something unpleasant to a teacher means they "need therapy and to be kept separated from each other", because "they are little psychopaths" who "should have contact with the justice system to make sure they do not do this to someone else", because "planning to murder someone is a crime".

[DeSwiss]

62. Agreed.

- I blame television.

[KittyWampus]

78. The girls told other kids they were going to "KILL" the teacher.

The Elba Elementary School students had learned that their teacher was severely allergic to hand sanitizer, and they allegedly planned to put sanitizer on items they knew the teacher would touch, according to WKBW. Deputies say the students involved told other kids at school they were going to “kill” their teacher in this way.

When youth officers interviewed the girls, one of them said the teacher “yells at us" and "the class has problems with her,” according to WGRZ.

The students never actually went through with the plan, the Daily News Online reports. The alleged plot was uncovered in mid-December, and Genesee County Sheriff's stated this week that the case has been closed after authorities determined no crime had been committed.


http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/01/09/fourth-graders-plot-to-kill-teacher-hand-sanitizer_n_6443286.html

[NanceGreggs]

82. I don't take the chatter of nine-year-olds seriously.

They're kids.

[Bay Boy]

79. With an allergy to hand sanitizer...

...I can't imagine a worse place to work than a school.
As someone else mentioned maybe the teacher wears gloves while at school but then the kids 'plot' already had a flaw.

[HockeyMom]

80. My hands get raw and will bleed

I am sure I must have touched doorknobs after the kids touched them. That didn't affect me. Probably because it had dryed? Maybe it had to be in liquid form?

I did wear disposable gloves when I had to clean tables with that stuff. I brought in my own cocoa butter soap to wash my own hands. I had to hide my soap from the kids because they liked it better. lol Sorry, kiddos, no. It was too expensive for 19 people to use on a daily basis. Yeah, they said I was "mean" but never plotted to kill me for that.

When I first saw this deadline, I thought they were going to put hand sanitizer in her COFFEE. That would make her very sick, allergy or no allergy.