Girl's arrest for doodling raises concerns about zero tolerance

By Stephanie Chen, CNN

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"They put the handcuffs on me, and I couldn't believe it," Alexa Gonzalez, 12, said of her arrest.
"They put the handcuffs on me, and I couldn't believe it," Alexa Gonzalez, 12, said of her arrest.

(CNN) -- There was no profanity, no hate. Just the words, "I love my friends Abby and Faith. Lex was here 2/1/10 :)" scrawled on the classroom desk with a green marker.

Alexa Gonzalez, an outgoing 12-year-old who likes to dance and draw, expected a lecture or maybe detention for her doodles earlier this month. Instead, the principal of the Junior High School in Forest Hills, New York, called police, and the seventh-grader was taken across the street to the police precinct.

http://www.cnn.com/2010/CRIME/02/18/new.york.doodle.arrest/index.html?hpt=C1