School Wrong to Suspend Students for Viewing Web Site on Their Own Time

Here's another strange one.

A school out in California suspended twenty middle school students for viewing a web site that contained "graphic threats" from one student at the school to another.

The student making the threat is under threat of expulsion for doing it. The incident happened on the popular MySpace.com site that many students use to post stuff on. The police are also trying to use anti-hate laws against the student as it contained several slurs. These investigations are entirely appropriate.

Here's the problem: the other students did not view the web site at school, nor during school hours. They viewed it from their own homes on their own time with their own family or personal computer.

Does the school have a right to do what it has done to the students? There was no criminal wrongdoing on the part of those students who simply viewed the post and then moved on to other sites on their own time, on their own computers outside of school.

It seems to me that the school already has their suspect in hand; the others shouldn't be punished, unless they made similar kinds of threats on the web too. Student safety is a valid school concern, but the information being presented suggests that there was no further threat to student safety once the original transgressor was caught.

This will probably end up in court.