Cyber threats on the rise

NEA Today, Jan 2001 by Simpson, Michael D

School officials and courts are struggling with an epidemic of Web pages where students ridicule, vilify, and even threaten to kill teachers.

Justin Swidler was ticked off. So the eighth-grader from Bethlehem, Pennsylvania created his own Web page titled "Teacher Sux." There he posted a vicious attack on his math teacher, Kathleen Fulmer, and principal, Thomas Kartsotis.

For starters, the student created a picture of Fulmer with her head cut off and blood pouring from her neck.

Accompanying the illustration was the question, "Why Should She Die?" under which he wrote, "Take a look at the diagram and the reasons I give, then give me $20.00 to help pay for the human."

The site was rife with profanity, displayed a photograph of Fulmer morphing into Hitler, and showed a likeness of Kartsotis being hit by a cartoon bullet.

Word spread, and 234 visitors viewed the site. The Web page shook up the entire school community, particularly Fulmer. The threats caused her serious health problems that ultimately led to her retirement after a 26-year career.

Swidler was expelled for threatening, harassing, and disrespecting a teacher and principal, but he challenged the discipline on free speech grounds.

Last July, the Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania upheld the expulsion, ruling that school officials can "discipline students for off-campus activity where that activity materially and substantially interferes with the education process." In this case, the damage caused to Fulmer and to the school community met that legal standard.

"Regrettably, in this day and age where school violence is becoming more commonplace, school officials are justified in taking very seriously threats against faculty and other students," the court said.

Swidler's words were "disrespectful" and "constituted harassment and threats." The student may have meant his comments as "mere hyperbole," but he crossed, the court concluded, "that line of conduct that we, as a society, find acceptable."

Justin Swidler's legal troubles aren't over yet. Fulmer and her husband have sued him and his parents for damages. In November, a Northampton County jury awarded Fulmer $450,000 for invasion of privacy and $50,000 to her husband for loss of consortium.

The jury specifically found that Swidler's parents were liable because they failed to properly supervise their son. A civil lawsuit by principal Kartsotis against the Swidlers is still pending.

In a related case, the Indiana State Teachers Association last year sponsored a lawsuit on behalf of three teachers from Carmel who were identified in a student's Web site as "satan worshipping demons."

Titled "tyme-2-dye," the Web site urged fellow students to shun and laugh at the named teachers and was illustrated by various satanic symbols. One of the teachers targeted by the Web site discovered it on April 21, 1999, the day after the Columbine shootings.

In a settlement announced last May, Brian Conradt and his mother agreed to pay the teachers $5,000.

The law in this area is still developing. As the cases discussed in the sidebar attest, not every "offensive" comment posted on a student Web site will justify discipline.

But, at a minimum, student off-campus cyberspeech is punishable where school officials reasonably believe it could disrupt the school, or where it seriously threatens or actually causes harm to teachers or others.

In a 1986 decision, the Supreme Court gave school officials wide discretion to discipline students for uncivil speech while in school. The Court said that schools "must teach the shared values of a civilized social order" and are free to determine "that the essential lessons of civil, mature conduct cannot be conveyed in a school that tolerates lewd, indecent, or offensive speech."

But the still-open question is whether this authority extends to offcampus speech and whether school officials can punish students for comments made in cyberspace that are merely uncivil or disrespectful. That question will be decided as student use-and misuse-of the Internet increases.

- Michael D. Simpson

NEA Office of General Counsel