
Help Kiera with her legal bills - ajaymehta
https://www.crowdtilt.com/campaigns/help-keira-with-her-legal-bills-she-was-expelled-and-charged-with-felony-after-a-harmless-science-mistake/description
======
greghinch
To all the people who are towing the "this was inappropriate/unsafe behavior
and she deserves her punishment" line, fine, but at most a suspension from
school would seem fitting. Expulsion and 2 felony counts is ridiculous.
Ruining a young girls life because of a mistake in which no one was hurt,
whether she should have known or not, is not the answer.

~~~
lobotryas
What if someone was hurt by this incident? How would this change your outlook
on the situation?

~~~
InclinedPlane
You're being ridiculous. What if she brought a nuclear bomb to school? What
then?

As far as this specific case. Even if she had held the "bomb" next to another
student's face the likelihood of any significant injury would be low. People
have held dry ice bombs and draino bombs in their hands as they have gone off
with the only consequence being momentary pain and perhaps some bruising.
People get hurt worse playing school sports.

And in this case nobody was hurt, not even a little.

~~~
DanBC
> People have held dry ice bombs and draino bombs in their hands as they have
> gone off

Drano contains sodium hydroxide. (Different amounts in different drano
products.) Sodium hydroxide is really fucking nasty.

A chemical burn from sodium hydroxide is difficult to irrigate. Chemical burns
need to be treated by a hospital. They may need skin grafts.

So, when making a "drano bottle-popper"[1] please please wear nitrile gloves.

I agree that it's ridiculous to call the police; charge her with a crime; try
her as an adult on federal charges; try her for a crime that carries any kind
of prison sentence. Any punishment should have been kept in school.

[1] Perhaps we need to define bomb a bit better. This reaction is just
creating steam?

~~~
droithomme
Please note it was not drano, it was HCl based toilet cleaner. The reaction of
HCl and Al results in hydrogen gas and aluminum chloride salt.

~~~
DanBC
Ah, thanks for the correction.

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btilly
I thought of this with the Aaron Schwartz case. This makes me think of it
again.

I'd love it if there was a service named something like Karma. When something
like this happens, I could register a name, a reason, and a frequency. With no
more than that frequency I'll be sent information on stories involving that
name, with my reason attached.

The idea is that in a case like this I could search, find that the prosecutor
in the case is "Tammy Glotfelty", and until I lost interest in the case would
get updated on what she's doing. That way if she ever, for instance, ran for
election I could be reminded, and know that it is time to donate to her
opponent in said race.

~~~
gmurphy
You could use Google Alerts (or equivalent), which gets you the name and
frequency, then embed the reason in the search string in a way that won't
match anything.

e.g: Tammy Glotfelty -"reason: keira science experiment"

~~~
btilly
This is nice, but Google Alerts is near the top of Gwern's list of "likely to
be killed Google products." That gives me pause about relying on it.

~~~
dhimes
Yahoo also has it- but, of course, there is the same danger there I suppose.

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TallGuyShort
If the way this incident is described is accurate I definitely would like to
support Kiera, but it's all been very one-sided so far. I'm yet to see anyone
detail what the chemicals were or what the setting was in which this occurred.
Those are important details to understand in order to tell if this really was
something reckless or if it was just a proper science experiment. Anyone know
of such sources?

~~~
uvdiv
Here's the police report: <http://www.scribd.com/doc/138927259/Wilmot-Arrest>

The chemicals were aluminum foil and hydrochloric acid. The setting was near
an outdoors gazebo on school grounds. The context was, in her first version, a
"science fair project"; in her second version, she was following instructions
given by a friend, not aware it would explode.

~~~
marshray
It said toilet bowl cleaner <http://www.theworkscleans.com/toiletcleaner.html>
and aluminum foil.

Here's the MSDS data sheet for "The Works"
[http://www.chemtura.com/msd/external/e/result/report.jsp?P_L...](http://www.chemtura.com/msd/external/e/result/report.jsp?P_LANGU=E&P_SYS=6&P_SSN=67698&P_REP=00000000000000000017&P_RES=7590)

IIRC, that combination should release H2 and a little heat, but not enough
heat to ignite anything. So the bottle basically went "fizz" and "pop".

Some of those plastic bottles can make a loud pop.

~~~
Alex3917
From the company's website:

"IT IS A VIOLATION OF FEDERAL LAW TO USE THIS PRODUCT IN A MANOR INCONSISTANT
WITH ITS LABELING."

~~~
dredmorbius
Clearly, then, school grounds fall outside this limitation.

~~~
Vivtek
Because the school is not a manor?

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gruseom
It's true that we don't have enough information to tell what was really going
on, but I donated anyway. What the kid appears to have done—mixed stuff
together to see what would happen—falls in the "moderate" part of the spectrum
of things that curious teenagers do. A lot of significant contributors to
society, not to mention a lot of people on this site, have similar episodes in
their past. I figure the least we can give her is the benefit of the doubt,
and we live in a system where the benefit of the doubt has a price: adequate
legal representation. Let her have a good lawyer and let's see how long those
felony charges last.

One thing's for sure, that lawyer will be able to call on a long list of
prestigious expert witnesses.

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guelo
Who is Angelle Stromeyer and why should I trust that the money will go to
Kiera Wilmot?

~~~
ajaymehta
Crowdtilt's official twitter account has posted that the campaign is verified
[1], and we'll handle disbursements of the funds directly to Kiera's family
(I'm a representative). Angelle is a Crowdtilt user who was touched by Kiera's
story, and wanted to do something about it!

[1] <https://twitter.com/Crowdtilt/status/330475205183012864>

~~~
vl
Why there is no anonymous donations with guest account?

I want to contribute to the cause, but don't care about letting "the campaign
admin and others know who is making this contribution".

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rjvir
Regardless of her outcome with her current school, people in the future will
respect her curiosity. This experience could shape into an awesome college
application essay.

~~~
sukuriant
And a felony record is, in many cases, an instant stop for many employers,
even if the felony is completely unrelated to their future job

~~~
mapt
And, apparently, for many _colleges_.

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rayiner
Better would be finding a lawyer in Florida willing to take this pro bono.
Maybe figure out a way to countersue the school.

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omarrr
At least 50% of the teenagers in this world who have access to products X and
Y would mix them up if somebody told them that mixing X and Y will create an
explosion.

That's the nature of being a teenager. As far as I'm concerned teenagers are
showing more signs of mental health than adults these days.

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np422
When I was a kid/teenager I blew up everything from large condensators, old TV
sets, pet-bottles and one time there was even a broken window.

I didn't end up as a criminal or a terrorist .... I got and engineering
degree.

Society need to reacquire common sense and a sense of humour.

------
duncan_bayne
I've contributed. I once shocked my high school physics teacher (literally) by
messing with an electric motor we'd made in class. If I'd done that in Kiera's
school I'd probably have been waterboarded by the principal or something.

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SaraRhiannon
[http://www.change.org/petitions/state-attorney-jerry-hill-
dr...](http://www.change.org/petitions/state-attorney-jerry-hill-drop-charges-
against-kiera-wilmot)

to anyone who thinks Kiera's charges should be dropped, sign this petition on
change.org...it still needs over 5,000 signatures. we have to save her.

------
dlitz
Updated info about the case, from Kiera's lawyer:
[http://www.businessinsider.com/kiera-wilmot-lawyer-hoping-
to...](http://www.businessinsider.com/kiera-wilmot-lawyer-hoping-to-prevent-
felony-charges-from-being-filed-2013-5)

------
argumentum
Donated. I often wonder what the motivation is behind charges like these. It's
often political, as in the Swartz case. But I think usually, it's simply that
the DAs get satisfaction from being bullies.

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gailees
Finally someone is actually doing something about this!

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antihero
Seriously though, which federal could sleep at night nay live with themselves
for prosecuting on this one?

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kmfrk
Even if you still think she's guilty as sin, ask yourself whether you trust
the American justice system enough to let her go through the ringer without
financial support.

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antihero
Surely for crimes there has to be motive.

------
tiredofcareer
I'm not trolling.

Why does this girl deserve attention? Why did she get it? I genuinely can't
come up with a reason.

Are you guys prepared to contribute to the legal funds of everyone who is
expelled and charged with crimes for unfair reasons? Because this is
absolutely not out of ordinary, and I've personally seen a 12-year-old
expelled and nearly charged with a crime because his mother packed him a steak
knife without realizing the school's zero-tolerance policy.

I wish this girl the best and she deserves a fair trial, but sometimes I
wonder if society's tack of showering money on people's legal fund merely
because they made news puts incentives in the right places...

If you down vote, can you explain why? I'd like to have an objective
conversation about this without drive-by downvotes to shut me up.

~~~
derrida
Curiosity is not a crime.

Court is a resource war. The true cost of a legal defence can _easily_ get
into the $100k range

I donated to make sure that their was a fair trial, or else we will have
someone pleading to a felony early for a school science experiment.

> Are you guys prepared to contribute to the legal funds of everyone who is
> expelled and charged with crimes for unfair reasons?

Yes, if I am aware of it & can afford it.

~~~
tiredofcareer
I'm not sure where you pulled that number from. I've successfully defended
against multiple charges in my life, unsuccessfully others, and the only money
I was out was a couple forms and bail, which I got back. The charges I got out
of involved a public defender. When I hired a lawyer, I was convicted.

I think there's a lot of misunderstanding about the criminal system from
people that have never been through it and, by the very nature of how the
criminal system works -- especially if you end up in front of a jury -- it's
impossible to predict how anything will play out.

I'm more concerned that people are donating to a legal fund after reading news
statements and, possibly, the police report.

~~~
derrida
> I'm not sure where you pulled that number from.

I have never been convicted. I have been through 5 court cases in my life
time, including reaching the Supreme Court both as a plaintiff and as a
defendant. I am 26.

~~~
lobotryas
Are you saying that your appeals to SCOTUS were heard both times or that they
were merely considered and later rejected?

