Blog #461: My Reaction to the Brendan Depa Conviction and Sentencing
- Jeffrey Snyder
- Aug 14, 2024
- 4 min read
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“It’s not a mistake. It’s a choice.”
-Jon Taffer, Host of “Bar Rescue”
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I’m sure many of you have recently heard that a neurodivergent individual was sentenced to 5 years in prison and 15 years of probation for assaulting a teacher’s aide when she took away his Nintendo Switch last year. As a former special education student, I know that while the sentence may seem harsh on account of the individual being neurodivergent, it sends a clear message that just because you have a difference it doesn’t make you above the law.
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Brendan Depa was 17 years old at the time that he attacked his teacher’s aide. Seeing the video made me sick to my stomach and it still does as I hold a great deal of respect to schoolteachers on account that they put in passion and dedication to their jobs of educating today’s youth.
Naturally, the debate in question isn’t really a debate as a whole. Handheld video games do not belong in an educational setting of any kind. When it comes to education, you are there to learn and not slack off. If you bring a handheld video game into school, you have to deal with the consequences.
What Brendan Depa did to the teacher’s aide was not only violent, but also traumatizing to the aide who now deals with PTSD as a result of Brendan’s actions. The fact is that we have to accept responsibility for our actions isn’t a mistake, it’s a choice. Brendan made a choice to bring a Nintendo Switch into school and he made a choice to violently attack the teacher’s aide. He also made a choice to not understand that there is a time and a place for work and pleasure, not strictly pleasure.
I mean, I will say that it is a sad situation here that Brendan is neurodivergent and took a bunch of medications to cope with everyday life. But there is clearly no excuse for the behaviors that he displayed on that fateful day. Just because you have special needs or what have you, you do not get a free pass at everything in life. When you have to go to school, you need to treat going to school like you are going to a job. Not everyone is going to get the message nor take the message in stride, but that’s just the way life is in education.
Teachers, administrators and school personnel should not have to be subjected to this kind of behavior because what would have happened if things had gone one step further? The fact is that some of today’s students are getting a free pass in defying authority and whether they are neurodivergent or neurotypical, they need to understand that actions have consequences. Some students will do anything to get their way and will try and walk over anyone who stands in front of them.
There are even some students who react the way they do because they have no other alternative ideas.
Case in point?
When I was a junior in high school, I had bottled coffee thrown at me and I wasn’t even the intended target, the real target was one of my peers’ girlfriend. Still, it makes me wonder, what if the coffee had been hot?
What if I had gotten burned and I had to go to the emergency room to be treated for burns on me?
The truth of the matter is that when we make a choice, we have to deal with the fallout from that choice. The guy was suspended, even though I was against it because he didn’t have any beef with me. But it was still a choice that he made to throw that bottle of coffee at me in the first place, even though I wasn’t the intended target.
It was a choice for Brendan Dupa to attack the teacher’s aide and he’s going to have to live with said choice for the rest of his natural life. When teachers go to school, they aren’t going to get beat up to within an inch of their lives. When students go to school, they are going to learn and maintain standards that their elders have set upon them. It was Brendan’s choice to not live up to the standards that his school had set upon him by bringing a handheld video game to school that fateful day.
The only mistake here is that Brendan did not live the Nintendo switch at home that day. If he had chosen to leave the Nintendo Switch at home, he wouldn’t have been in the situation he is in now.
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In conclusion, I choice to view going to school the same way as going to a job. On the job, you are to follow standards and protocols that are set for you. I didn’t bring any handheld video games to school and I didn’t even start using a cell phone until I was 16 or 17 years old. I treated my teachers and administrators with respect the same way I later treated my supervisors and bosses at Borders and Stop & Shop.
My only hope now is that Brendan’s situation serves as another warning to students that the choices we make will come back to bite us if we make the wrong choice. When we are in school or at a job, we leave the distractions at home and face the consequences when we make the wrong choice instead of the right choice.
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Catch you all later!!
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