Credit: www.10tv.com
May is a transitional month. Not only does it bring temperatures that occasionally rise above 60 degrees, but it instills a feverish excitement in the hearts of many high school seniors: Graduation is just around the corner. And with it come the brash and inevitable attempts by 18-year-olds to “leave their mark” on their alma maters.

Six seniors at River Valley High School thought that they had concocted a masterful scheme, the end-all, be-all of senior pranks: chopping down 23 trees on the school’s property.

…Wait, sorry, weren’t senior pranks supposed to contain an element of humor? In what realm is littering your school’s campus with a bunch of stumps funny? Spray painting detailed phallic imagery on the main entrance doors might have even been in better taste, for God’s sake.

Three of the tricksters were charged with one count of felony vandalism, while the other three were charged with one count of complicity to vandalism. 

Ain’t no better way to kick off a post-high school career than felony vandalism charges, am I right?

This article appears in May 7-13, 2014.

Cortni Dietz is a senior at Ohio University and a Scene blogging intern. When taking a break from the rigorous pursuit of journalism, she enjoys eating, reading, hanging out with dogs of all shapes and sizes and drinking overpriced coffee.

5 replies on “Ohio Teens Chop Down Trees as Senior ‘Prank,’ Felony Charges Ensue”

  2. Let beavers attend high school they said. Nothing bad would happen they said. Thankfully the vandals were caught by french fur trappers and had coats made with their shiny pelts.

  3. A good senior prank would be to chop off the hands of these juvenile senior a-holes.

    Whatever happened to plain old humor? The class ahead of me ran their jockstraps up the flagpole…along with a homemade flag that read “We Support Our School!” That one was remembered for years, as was the prank of my class…nicknames of some of the top athletes sprayed on a railroad overpass behind the school. Since the railroad seldom repainted their bridges, those names remained up there for more than two decades.

    This was just vandalism and destruction for the hell of it. Put the little bastards in the slammer.

    Chuckles the Clown

  4. This was beyond stupid. There is such a thing as going too far, and these seniors just found out what that is. A good senior prank does no lasting damage to the school or any people/property.

  5. To the judge who hears this case: Why not make a statement and demonstrate the real underappreciated and unseen value of those trees. Ask the little darling vandals what they think might happen if they were sentenced to serve a one hour punishment together in a sealed glass room out of which would be pumped the equivalent of the 240 lbs. of oxygen each of those 23 trees have provided annually? Make ’em replant them and more…

Comments are closed.