A nerf gun gets you a felony these days.
Some things, you just can’t make up. One angry mother, Stefanie Carpenter, took to social media to share her story after her son was charged with a felony for using a toy gun. Carpenter says that she waited 217 days to have the Class 5 felony charge of menacing expunged from Gavin’s record before coming forward with her story.
As reported by Fox News 21, On July 24, Gavin and his friend were playing outside his grandparent’s house before a planned sleepover that night. The two kids began to play with orange-tipped nerf guns, aiming at cars and pretending to play Fortnite. One driver became so irate that he turned around and returned to scold the kids. The interaction was captured on the grandparent’s Ring system.
The enraged driver called the police on Gavin and his friend which led to Gavin being cuffed and placed into the back of a cop car before his parents arrived. “They came back over, told me my rights, and told me what was going to happen. They put handcuffs on me, and I got into the car,” 10-year-old Gavin Carpenter said.
The El Paso County Sheriff refused to drop the felony menacing charge, “It was just a hard no, that the District Attorney wasn’t going to throw this out,” Gavin’s father Chris stated. “That is when we moved into the diversion program.” The diversion program is much like probation, which meant Gavin had to complete community service, write an essay, and complete various tasks before the expunge occurred.