Hate-Filled Messages Flood MCPS in Wake of Rape Allegations (VIDEOS)
Hate-fueled invective has filled the lines of communication into the Montgomery County Public Schools in the wake of rape allegations of Rockville High School.
Many of the email messages can’t be repeated because of the profanity, but the messages that lack profanity contain disturbing images. One message to Superintendent Jack Smith: “For the glory of fairness and social justice, you must abort yourself.” Another expressed hope that Dr. Smith’s wife and children are locked in a prison and gang raped.
One message arrived, in all capital letters: “I will not allow any of my children to attend public school as long as mentally impaired scum, like you, are working for my public school system.”
Telephone messages, too, are filled with hate and profanity.
“Some callers just want to vent which when they are thoughtful and polite and even if they’re concerned and angry, those are acceptable calls,” MCPS spokesman Derek Turner said. “But when it goes from a concern and anger to racist threatening language, it really serves as a distraction for our ability to do our jobs.”
Callers on Wednesday threatened to bring guns to shoot illegal immigrants, sparking the principal to ask Montgomery County police to send officers to the school.
The messages follow allegations that a 14-year-old student at the school was raped by two other students—one 17 and the other 18—who had arrived from Central America.
The hate shows up on school system’s social media channels, too. Posts on Twitter about events at other schools garner messages blasting Smith and the school system. One person has posted several times asking Rockville students to come forward if the superintendent ever behaved inappropriately. Based on his Twitter profile, he appears to live in New York state.
In addition to those Twitter messages, emails also are coming from outside the county. One signed message says she lives in Florida. One is signed as a former Maryland resident who now lives in West Virginia. One person used an email address for a company based in South Carolina. The signature of one included a cell phone number with a Denver area code.
One person claimed he’s glad he doesn’t live in the school district so his taxes aren’t paying for the salary of a school system staffer. Another uses a web domain for an apparently defunct Tennessee company.
Turner said the messages are concerning because they have become a distraction to executing the school system’s mission to protecting and educating students.
“All of these things that aren’t on the issue but have been spurred by what we’re seeing as this politicization of this issue,” he said. “It stopped being about individuals who did abhorrent acts and a victim who is suffering. And now it’s about the immigration debate and whether people feel that students from foreign countries should be allowed to get an education in our school system.”
The County Council, too, is getting its share of vitriol. Council President Roger Berliner said Monday that the issue has raised “a firestorm of anger.”
Berliner also objected to the notion that the county is not cooperating with federal authorities. Although Immigration and Customs Enforcement has listed Montgomery as a jurisdiction that does not assist in immigration cases, Berliner insisted the county provides whatever information it can to ICE.
Trump was right, these trespassers are thieves and rapists