In a disturbing twist of events, two graduating senior football players from a Chicago high school were arrested in their caps and gowns at their commencement ceremony for allegedly robbing a former teacher at gunpoint just a day earlier.
As reported by the Chicago Sun-Times and a handful of others sources, 18-year-old Chicago (Ill.) Marshall Metro High students Brandon Davis and Dreyvon Williams were both arrested on charges of armed robbery, aggravated battery, attempted aggravated vehicular hijacking, unlawful vehicle invasion and unlawful restraint after they arrived at their high school commencement ceremony earlier in June. The pair have been charged in connection with an attempted car jacking of a former female teacher that both teenagers met while she was teaching at Marshall Metro.
After they were handcuffed on site, both teens were immediately taken to a Cook County jail, where they have been held on a prohibitive $75,000 bond for more than two weeks.
While the charges against both teens are serious, the mother of one insists her son is not guilty of any of the assault claims that have been levied against him. Rather, she insists that both her son and her son's friend had known teacher for more than a year, even after she left the school.
"Twenty minutes into the graduation, my son sent me a text message saying: 'Mama the police got me. This lady said I robbed her,'" Brandy Davis, Brandon's mother, told the Sun-Times. "I ran out of the graduation and I find the principal, and the dean and the police officer and my son is on his way to Harrison and Kedzie.
"My son is being railroaded."
What is more confusing about the incident is precisely what role the former teacher had taken in relation to the two teens charged with her assault. The unnamed victim had not taught at Marshall for more than a year but was on campus at the time of the assault. Police records show that she was there to pick up a ticket to the school's graduation, though she also offered to drive at least one student home from the school.
Additionally, while the teacher's age has not been disclosed, she has been described as a "young female," leading at least one writer to question whether she and the students were involved in an inappropriate relationship.
Regardless of what the connection between the former teacher and students were, the actions described in the police report of the incident — including the brandishing of a firearm, a chase from Williams, a physical altercation and a pit bull bite — deserve significant punishment. The question may turn to whether the teacher herself may have put herself at undue risk by fostering a relationship with two football players outside the classroom after she had departed the school itself.
Now, the final day that both teens were expected to spend at the school will carry tragic memories rather than happy ones, whether they were guilty of the crimes they are accused of or not.
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