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8th-grader faces felony charge for changing teacher's desktop background

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Published in Weird News

HOLIDAY, Fla. (UPI) -- A Florida eighth-grader is facing felony hacking charges after he used his school's computer network to prank a teacher with a photo of two men kissing.

Pasco County Sheriff Chris Nocco said Domanik Green, 14, used an administrative-level password to access the secure computer network at Paul R. Smith Middle School in Holiday on March 31 and change the desktop background photo to one showing two men kissing.

"Even though some might say this is just a teenage prank, who knows what this teenager might have done," Nocco told the Tampa Bay Times.

Green, who was charged with felony offense against a computer system and unauthorized access, said he learned the password -- a teacher's last name -- by watching a teacher type it in two years ago.

Green and several other students were previously suspended for using the password to access the network.

"If they would have notified me it was illegal, I wouldn't have done it in the first place. But all they said was, 'You shouldn't be doing that,'" Green told WTSP-TV.

 

The student was suspended for 10 days along with his arrest.

The teenager's mother, Eileen Foster, said the felony charge doesn't fit the crime.

He had the chance to get into the FCAT files, he had the chance to change grades, to do whatever you can do in the FCAT files and he didn't take it," Foster said. "I think that alone proves he doesn't deserve a felony charge."

Green said the prank was directed at a teacher he doesn't like, but it was spotted by a substitute and reported to officials.

School district spokeswoman Linda Cobbe said the network password is being changed.


Copyright 2015 by United Press International

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