Students Poison Teacher's Coffee, Cupcake In Fifth Grade Class

Teachers beware: The bad apples in your classrooms may be the ones left on educators' desks.

One instructor at Balderas Elementary in Fresno, Calif., learned this lesson first-hand as three fifth grade students were expelled Saturday for attempting to poison their teacher.

According to Fresno TV station CBS47, two boys and one girl attempted to feed their teacher rat poison in a cup of coffee and, later, in the frosting of a cupcake. The CBS affiliate reported that the plot was uncovered two months after an attempt when "a parent was bragging that her son saved the teacher's life by preventing her from drinking the poisoned coffee." The boy in question was allegedly the one who came up with the idea in the first place.

The incident occurred the week before the school's December vacation, after the young boy urged a female classmate to bring in some rat poison leftover from work being done at her home. KMJ News reported that the boy told her to "Bring some of that, we have rodents too."

Fresno Teacher's Association President Greg Gadams told KMJ News that "a systematic 'lack of action' on the part of Fresno Unified breeds these problems because they 'provide nothing for these students beyond disciplinary action.'"

The three students -- two age 10 and one age 11 -- have been transferred to the Phoenix Academy, which Raw Story reported regularly enrolls expelled students. According to the website, at least one teacher at their new school is openly concerned about the children.

"I believe the police should press criminal charges against these students," teacher David Cross told Raw Story. "They've openly admitted they've done it."

Gadams expressed similar sentiments, telling KMJ News that the students should be charged for their actions as the alleged poisoning attempt was clearly premeditated.

A sixth-grader at Balderas Elementary School told CBS47, "I heard that they reason why they did it was because they didn't like the teacher... Because [they're] strict."

Comments

[Amie Nogrady]

03:20 AM on 03/22/2012

Teachers find it hard to find a middle ground with the students. Some parents cannot be bothered to parent or are just so afraid of their own kid they are lost. Everyone is everyone else's business. And this is what we get. Kids that are so vicious and mean to one another and to the adults around them that this starts sounding normal to them. And what is the solution? Going back to the days where people just turned a blind eye to someone taking discipline just that one step too far? There has to be a middle ground where people can regain control of their children without being investigated every other day because little Johnny didn't get his way or because Susie was sent to her room for mouthing off. My daughter had to come in half an hour early because of a little minor, snippy comment. She told me I am the meanest mother ever. My reply "good, then I am doing my job. Top of her class and always well liked by her teachers.

[azdt]

09:51 PM on 03/04/2012

The kids probably saved themselves from being molested.

[kathy smelser]

08:04 AM on 03/26/2012

where did being molested come from ?......i think these kids need a lot of help ..

[jpp229206]

09:57 PM on 03/01/2012

It definitely has to do with parenting! Nowadays, parents are their kid's "friends" instead of enforcing good behaviour, respect, discipline, etc.
Violence on TV, internet and computer games makes them lose the ability to distinguish between fiction and reality. When they kill some one in a PC game, they feel no sense of guilt nor remorse since they don't see it as something wrong that will bring consequences, so when they are in real life, they believe that things are similar to the fictional PC games.

[takethetime]

09:27 PM on 03/01/2012

They probably did it because they were told they'd have to read another Harry Potter book.

[POpgrssve]

04:12 PM on 03/01/2012

Little b$#$#@@$@!

[bamagrl410]

03:23 PM on 03/01/2012

Are you serious? What is up with all these psychotic and emotionally distraught kids today? Kids are becoming more and more uncontrollable everyday because their so called parents do nothing to discipline them! WAKE UP PEOPLE! Your kids are pushing each other around, killing others, hurting themselves. They deserve to have criminal action taken against them. They clearly knew what they were doing and it's just WRONG to let them get away with this simply by changing what school they go to.

[kathy smelser]

08:12 AM on 03/26/2012

the reason why some kids are so bad is because they are never punished for the bad things they do . all you hear is they are just kids or my favorite they go to church ..and then when they grow up and kill their families or other kids or strangers ..no one seems to have a clue ...and by then it is just to late

[Gone Green]

03:05 PM on 03/01/2012

I can think of a few teachers who could have been dealt with so when I was 11. I wish I'd thought of it then. Would have saved myself a lot of merciless humiliation at the hands of those barbarians we gave the title of teacher to.

[Lindsgrace33]

01:36 PM on 03/01/2012

Wow. I remember some kid at my middle school tried to put ex-lax in a substitute teachers coffee. Luckily, it never happened. But rat poison? Twice?? Is it just me or does it sound like kids are doing more violent and scary things everyday? Kids bringing guns to school, kids actually shooting people, kids committing suicide....what is wrong with the world?

[Mrs Kensington]

01:09 PM on 03/03/2012

What is scary is these are the kids of the kids I went to elementary school with and they were mean. They weren't killing anyone but the were spewing hate on a daily basis. It is not surprising that their kids are evil. Plus, the mean kids were the ones the teachers liked. Think Carrie and all.

[kathy smelser]

08:18 AM on 03/26/2012

i was raised in the 60s....and my parents and friends parents put the fear of god in us ...the things that kids get away with now would have never happened back then ....but their were a few kids that were very good at shooting spit balls ...and that act carried a big penalty

[am10]

10:25 AM on 03/01/2012

Waiting for education reformers to say this teacher failed.

[Amie Nogrady]

03:11 AM on 03/22/2012

You missed it. Someone suggested that it was a preemptive strike to prevent molestation. Someone is apparently jumping at shadows.

[kathy smelser]

08:25 AM on 03/26/2012

it is much easier to blame the victim ...next they can blame the Rat Poison ...then they could blame the coffee or the cupcake .....all of these reasons are so much easier to accept THAN BLAMING THE KIDS ....to stretch a little more ...we could blame the economy.... global warming and of course the media..... everything is their fault

[geauxangel]

01:48 AM on 03/01/2012

What is wrong with these kids? The criminals are getting younger by the minute...I never thought of anything so dastardly when I was a child...and my now grown children would have never considered killing someone as a solution to a problem...and they are just now getting out of high school...these three children sound like cold, emotionless, future murderers...what is the world coming to, as my mamaw often says....

[Kazoo1969]

01:38 AM on 03/01/2012

The Kids involved should be prosecuted before they really do kill someone! I'm not saying this just to see them locked up I want them to get some psychological help that they appear to be in desperate need of that's all! Help them before they really do kill someone or hurt someone, help them while they are still young enough to be helped and still can be a good citizen!

[sactoken]

11:22 PM on 02/29/2012

More importantly what was the teacher's value-added test scores? If the teacher isn't increasing those kids' scores perhaps this is a fitting evaluation.

[kathy smelser]

08:32 AM on 03/26/2012

what poor kid cannot pass a test so the solution is to kill the teacher ....these children were never taught respect for adults or the difference between right and wrong and it is not the teachers job to do this

[Goldie Treasure]

09:39 PM on 02/29/2012

These students like many others are out of control and it's the fault of the parents who want everyone else to raise and discipline their children but them.

[Nana610]

12:36 AM on 03/01/2012

I really don't think this has to do with parenting...

[geauxangel]

01:52 AM on 03/01/2012

It definitely has to do with parenting..at least on some level....in my grandparents generation, kids were raised to respect, work hard, and were ruled with an iron fist...very strict...you didn't see this happening back then...now these kids raise themselves because their parents have to work just to feed them....they raise themselves by watching tv and the internet...when there is no one around to teach morals, then they won't learn morals...tv and internet are poor substitutions for parents...though some kids will turn out bad despite the best parenting...parents today are very far removed from the parents of our forefathers...

[kathy smelser]

08:33 AM on 03/26/2012

so who do you want to blame ?

[rewith85man]

09:37 PM on 02/29/2012

Truly, those students won't be able to get away with anything when they become older.

[kathy smelser]

08:35 AM on 03/26/2012

they should not be getting away with it now

[KenFromCalifornia]

09:04 PM on 02/29/2012

naw. attempted murder. if their sweet little minds can come up with such a scheme, then allowing them to hang around other teachers and students is way too much of a risk.