TRI In The News

Chesapeake Student Won't Be Expelled for Oregano

From The Virginian-Pilot
Original article available here.

A 13-year-old seventh-grader who passed around a bag of oregano at Hickory Middle School can return to school after his 10-day suspension was rescinded Thursday. The boy's legal advisers said the school system no longer plans to expel him.

The Rutherford Institute issued a news release saying officials had reversed course on expelling Adam Grass, who was suspended last week because oregano is considered "an imitation controlled substance."

"Adam should not have been punished in the first place," said John W. Whitehead, president of The Rutherford Institute, in the news release. "At no time did he violate the law or school policy."

The Charlottesville-based organization provides free legal services to people who it believes have had their constitutional or human rights threatened or violated.

In addition to being allowed to go back to school, Adam will not have a drug offense on his school record, Whitehead said.

"I was extremely happy that this is over and that finally someone stepped back and really took a look at the situation," Adam's father, Patrick Grass, said Thursday.

He said a deputy superintendent called to deliver the news to his wife.

Schools spokesman Tom Cupitt declined to comment, citing student privacy laws.

Adam was one of four boys at Hickory who were suspended because of the incident. One brought the oregano to school in a small plastic bag so it looked like marijuana, and Adam passed it from one student to another, Patrick Grass said.

"We've tried to make sure he understands that, yes, he probably had a lapse in judgment in passing it to the next boy," the father said, "but I definitely don't think he thought that this was going to come to anything like what happened."

The status of the other students' cases was not revealed because Cupitt would not comment.

On Tuesday, the school system had denied the family's appeal to have the charges dropped and Adam's record expunged, Whitehead said.

As a result, The Rutherford Institute had threatened to sue if the schools went forward.

"They were avoiding a lawsuit, and it was wise," Whitehead said in an interview. "Sometimes you have to force people to have common sense.

The family took a stand for the right thing."