"Class, for your next assignment, write an essay about the First Amendment."

Via Drudge, the Chicago Sun-Times reports that an eighteen year old honors student at Cary-Grove High School in Cary, Illinois has been arrested and charged with two counts of disorderly conduct as a result of his submitting a creative writing class essay that "described a violent dream in which he shot people and then 'had sex with the dead bodies.'"

"I have no intention of harming anyone,'' said Lee, who has been transferred to an alternative school setting. "I miss school.''

Lee's father, Albert Lee, who emigrated from China 32 years ago, said his son has a clean academic and police record. He, too, insisted his son's essay was not threatening but authorities "drew a conclusion before the investigation. They didn't want to do the investigation.''

Arrested, mind you! Not merely sent to some sort of counseling or disciplined by the typically idiotic and hyper-reactive "zero-tolerance" mindset of your average public high school, but arrested and charged by the police!

Of course, and especially because Lee is of Asian descent, the question immediately arises whether the actions taken by both school officials and the police were influenced by the recent Virginia Tech massacre. But whether there is some such connection in the fevered imagination of local authorities or not, unless there is far more to this incident than so far reported, this is simply outrageous.