12-Year-Old Sikh Boy Jailed in Texas for ‘Bomb Prank’

A 12-year-old Sikh boy was arrested and jailed in Texas for three days as a result of a prank in which a classmate accused the boy of carrying a bomb, local media reported Thursday.

Armaan Singh Sarai ended up in a juvenile detention center on Dec. 11 on charges of making “terroristic” threats after a classmate reported him for threatening to blow up Nichols Junior High School in Arlington, Dallas News reported.

While police were aware the report was part of a joke between the school children, they singled out Singh to put behind bars for three days without notifying his parents. He is now under house arrest with an ankle monitor until a new court date is scheduled.

“People have got to learn they cannot make these types of threats, which cause alarm, which cause evacuations,” police spokesman Lt. Christopher Cook told Dallas News. “Just because you say it’s a joke, it doesn’t get you out of trouble.”

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For Singh’s older brother, Aksh, the case is an injustice.

“My little brother Armaan Singh, 12 years of age, a loved kid by many was taken from school to Kimbo Juvenile center because he AND other students were joking about bomb threats,” Singh wrote in a Facebook post. “I know we live in a time where such an accusation is serious, but this is outrageous and I demand a justified reason for why a 12-year-old INDIAN boy was taken into police custody and sent to a jail.”

Before the news broke on Thursday, the story had already gone viral earlier this week when Singh’s older cousin recounted the events in a public Facebook post.

“It hurts my heart and boils my blood that there are people stupid enough out there not only accusing us, but our innocent children of being terrorists!” the post reads.

“This should show you how f**** up the system is! There are good people out there, but the majority of the system is corrupt! All these bas****s see is race & the color of your skin!” it added.

The incident follows that of a similar case that sparked international outrage in September. Ahmed Mohamed, a 14-year-old student, was forced out of his Texas school in handcuffs after a teacher called the police, suspicious that a homemade clock he brought to class was a bomb.

Ahmed Mohamed quickly became an international symbol of the horrid consequences of racism and Islamophobia reinforced by the Western War on Terror.