Mukilteo high school student charged with hate crime

MUKILTEO – A 16-year-old Kamiak High School student has been charged with a hate crime for allegedly vandalizing an LGBTQ club’s bulletin board.

On March 17, the school resource officer was alerted to spray paint on the Queer, Straight Alliance bulletin board on campus, according to charges filed Monday in Snohomish County Superior Court. Although security cameras do not show the painting directly, footage shows students walking towards it.

One was the 16-year-old student, according to police. He was 15 at the time of the incident. The Daily Herald does not name the accused because he is a minor.

A school security specialist and the vice principal removed the student from the classroom. One of them would have asked if he knew why.

“Yeah, spray paint,” he said, according to court documents.

The vice principal asked what the student knew about this. He would have said he had. Why, asked the administrator. He said he was against the LGBTQ community.

He later added that he was against everything the community stood for. What he was referring to was unclear. The teenager admitted vandalizing the QSA council twice, according to the charging documents. He then took the red paint can from his backpack and handed it to the administrators.

The same student was also the subject of another unrelated investigation, according to police. Also in March, a female student said she was joking with friends in class.

At one point in the conversation, she asked a friend to hate gay people. The friend pointed the finger at the accused, according to court documents. The student approached the 16-year-old and asked if he was homophobic.

The teenager said he hated “all the LGBT stuff”, police said. He reportedly added that he would “shoot someone out of school if they saw this (expletive).” Two witnesses also reported hearing the comment.

While the school district cannot share details about student discipline, the district said in a statement that it “does not condone destructive behavior intended to harass, bully, or intimidate other students.”

“Any such incident is investigated and appropriate consequences are given,” the statement said.

The 16-year-old is the second Snohomish County high school student charged with an anti-LGBTQ hate crime in recent weeks. In late June, prosecutors filed charges against a Monroe High School student, also 16, alleging he assaulted a classmate and called him “gay.”

Rue Jake Goldstein: 425 339-3439; [email protected]; Twitter: @GoldsteinStreet.

Gallery