Seven middle school students from Ohio will face a judge in juvenile court following a May incident in which five teachers were allegedly served food that contained bodily fluids.
Prosecutors in Delaware County, Ohio, filed charges Tuesday against seven students from Olentangy Hyatts Middle School. In May, the students, all 14-year-old boys, concocted a plan to serve food tainted with their bodily fluids to their teachers, according to prosecutors.
Four teachers ate food served during a class cooking contest that was allegedly contaminated with urine. Another teacher allegedly ate food contaminated with semen.
Multiple students are charged in relation to each incident.
Prosecutors say one of the teenagers, who is charged with felony assault, brought a plastic bag with his semen to school and dropped the substance on a crepe that was fed to a teacher.
According to the charges, the student planned the alleged assault days prior with other classmates.
Another student is charged with assault after prosecutors say he participated in the planning and brought his own semen to school but did not put it on the crepe.
A third student is charged with assault after he allegedly planned to pour urine into barbecue sauce and put it on food that was served to teachers.
Four other students are charged with complicity to assault in relation to the incidents.
"We thank law enforcement for their due diligence,” said Olentangy Schools in a statement. “Our teachers deserve respect and kindness, and anything less than that is completely unacceptable.”
Each teenager charged will face a judge in Delaware County Juvenile Court over the next three weeks.
An attorney representing four of the students referred to the incidents as a “prank.”
“This is an example of how easily influenced kids are by what they see on YouTube and social media. They are learning an extremely hard lesson. We feel horrible for these teachers,” he said in a statement.
He said he could not comment on whether the teenagers have been disciplined by the district or whether any of them are still enrolled at the middle school.
