You definitely raised some very pertinent questions. While it is very likely that the teacher was overzealous in calling the law to the classroom to deal with Ebrima, we need to ascertain what led up to this event. In the teacher's defense, there are certain situations when a student can become so unruly that the school cannot handle the situation and this usually means that outside help (the law) is needed. Maybe this was the case on that fateful day at Forster's Secondary school. Nevertheless, only in very special circumstances should the law be called to deal with "school situations." This should only happen in cases of violence, threats or vandalism. For this reason, I would very much like to hear the teacher's explanation of why he called in the "fire brigade." If the teacher is unable to give a reasonable explanation for his action, he should be suspended or perhaps dismissed from the school system. However, my point is that situations where excessive force is used to interrogate or discipline a suspect are not uncommon back home. To prove this point, I gave examples that showed that this type of brutality has always been prevalent in our society. If this tragic incident had not happened to the deceased, some other poor soul would have suffered the same fate. Unfortunately, it seems as if the same trend will go on. From the autopsy report that was published in the Independent, the culprits have been absolved of all blame. And, again, the Gambian public, with the exception of the brave students from the college, has chosen to remain oblivious to this alarming trend. The crux of my point is that if we are to stop events like this from happening in the future, we need to determine why this happened. We have to attack the problem from the root. This will not be achieved by crucifying the teacher. Instead, we need to reexamine these brutal methods that our law enforcement authorities use and also figure out ways to curb this disturbing trend. Until this is done, there will be more incidents like this. Regards, Yus ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe/subscribe or view archives of postings, go to the Gambia-L Web interface at: http://maelstrom.stjohns.edu/archives/gambia-l.html ----------------------------------------------------------------------------