Youth Gone Wild: The Opera

Act One:

The threats led officials to cancel classes for all students in the district last Monday. The previous day, (Superintendent Dave) Kragness heard that students had been sending messages -- including threats to shoot one student at school -- via computer, he said. Besides the arrests Friday, six students were suspended last week while authorities seized computers to trace the threatening messages. Kragness said the six have been identified as being involved in the threats in some way.

Act Two:

Two teenagers were arrested Friday in Isanti County after being accused of fatally shooting four horses and a cow. Sheriff's deputies found two 16-year-old boys and two loaded rifles with scopes in a 1993 Toyota Camry. They arrested the boys, who had skipped classes at St. Francis High School. Investigators said one of the teenagers confessed to shooting three horses and one cow.

Act Three

Francisco Javier Serrano, 22, whose story made news around the world, had been ordered by a judge to leave the United States because he was here illegally. On Jan. 5, he hugged supporters goodbye at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport and walked toward the security screeners. But he has not been heard from since -- in the United States or Mexico. Tim Counts, spokesman for the Immigration and Customs Enforcement's regional office in Bloomington, confirmed that his office does not know where Serrano is. He also said Serrano is one of about 450,000 people across the country who have orders to be removed from the country because of various
immigration violations.

The common link in these stories? Each of these youth were failed by a society that did not provide them with the ass kicking the so desperately needed at a critical juncture in their lives. I expect all three cases to ultimately result in the soft coddling the Minnesota criminal justice system is best known for.