Caleb Clemmons, Georgia Southern Student Jailed for Tumblr Joke, Still in Prison Awaiting Trial
ByHe had no weapons, made no legitimate threat, but wrote one unfortunate satirical joke on Tumblr and has been in jail for six months, Gawker reported.
Caleb Clemmons, a 20-year-old former psychology student at Georgia Southern University (GSU), posted to his Tumblr blog that he was going to shoot up his school. Clemmons used hi blog for creative writing and said the post was "an experimental literary piece and an art project."
On Feb. 8, he posted the following message: "hello. my name is irenigg and i plan on shooting up georgia southern. pass this around to see the affect it has. to see if i get arrested."
The police arrived hours later and took him to Bulloch County Jail, where he has been held ever since.
According to GSU's student newspaper the Geore-Anne, GSU Dean of Students Patrice Jackson notified the school one month after the arrest, because there was "no continuous threat."
Chief Michael Russell, director of Public Safety, said police found no weapons in his home and no plans to shoot up the school. Clemmons was charged with making a terroristic threat via computer.
According to Gawker, Clemmons has past arrests for marijuana possession and fighting with his stepfather. His family is worried these past arrests will keep him in jail longer because they do not have the money to post his $20,000 bail, nor hire a defense lawyer. His family also said he has been physically abused while in jail.
Clemmons' Tumblr page is now a site to gain attention and donations for legal fees, for his trial set to begin soon.
"Though Caleb might have chosen the wrong time to post a prank, his present punishment and possible fate is beyond my comprehension," she wrote on the site. "Caleb was attending a great school and had a promising future."
Even after the school publically acknowledged Clemmons' "threat," the story did not become widely recognized. Only six months after, when the Gawker article was published Sunday, the Huffington Post reported. It has still gained the attention of many with the family's GoFundMe.org page, set up to hire a lawyer, reaching nearly half their goal of $5,000.
"He essentially said he was doing it as an experiment to see how long it would take to have authorities respond," First Amendment Center President Ken Paulson told the Huffington Post. "That's foolhardy, but not illegal."