Six middle school students in Massachusetts are facing charges in connection to a racist online chat involving a mock slave auction, per NBC News.
According to Hampden District Attorney Anthony Gulluni, a group of eighth-grade students from Southwick Regional School participated in a Snapchat discussion last month that included "hateful and racist comments, including notions of violence toward people of color, racial slurs, derogatory pictures and videos, and a mock slave auction directed at two particular juveniles."
Upon discovering the chat, Gulluni said he called for an investigation into the incident by the Massachusetts State Police Detective Unit. Members of the Detective Unit and the Chief of the Juvenile Court Unit were authorized to pursue charges against the teens at the end of the investigation.
All six students are facing charges of threat to commit a crime. Two were also charged with interference with civil rights, and one is facing an additional charge of witness interference.
"Hatred and racism have no place in this community. And where this behavior becomes criminal, I will ensure that we act, and act with swift resolve, as we did here, to uncover it and bring it to the light of justice," Gulluni said. "There is no question that the alleged behavior of these six juveniles is vile, cruel, and contemptible."
"As I have described, through the work of my office’s investigators, and the work in court yet to come, we intend to appropriately punish those whose alleged behavior displayed a capacity for such hatred and cruelty and, ultimately, amounted to chargeable criminal conduct," he added.
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