Teens Won’t Be Charged for Palm Springs Racial Epithet

The 18 teenagers who participated in a prank with racially offensive overtones at Palm Springs High School last month will not be charged with a crime, the Riverside County district attorney’s office said Thursday.

“We have insufficient evidence to support the filing of criminal charges,” said Deputy Dist. Atty. Richard Erwood. “We don’t know who did what.”

The incident, which has stirred controversy in Palm Springs, occurred after midnight 12 days before commencement.

Students used washable white shoe polish to write “Seniors 2000” and other tributes on Palm Springs High School windows and sidewalks.

But a racial epithet and two obscenities, among other offensive markings, were written on the office windows of the principal, Ricky Wright, who is African American.

The Palm Springs Police Department termed the prank a “hate incident” and asked the district attorney to consider charging all the students involved with misdemeanor vandalism.

The students were 16 seniors from Palm Springs High School and two students from Mount San Jacinto High School, a continuing education facility in neighboring Cathedral City.

Wright suspended the Palm Springs High students for five days and barred them from commencement ceremonies and other graduation-week festivities.

Parents of the involved teenagers strongly objected to the punishment, arguing that it was too severe, that not all those in the group had taken part in the worst offense and that many of the students had top academic records and no histories of causing trouble.

But some high school students and residents, especially in the black community, said the principal was letting the teenagers off too easily. Some critics also faulted police for recommending that the teenagers be charged with misdemeanor vandalism instead of a hate crime, which is a felony.

The group consisted mostly of whites, but also included Latinos and Asian Americans. No African Americans were among them, authorities said.

School security officers caught one student near the scene of the incident and Palm Springs officers apprehended others later that morning.

Erwood, of the district attorney’s office, cited the lack of independent eyewitnesses and the students’ reluctance to cooperate with the police investigation as factors in the decision not to file charges.