Teen charged with terrorizing in CD case

ELLSWORTH – One of two Bucksport High School students who created a music CD with violent lyrics depicting a high school shooting has been formally charged with terrorizing.

The Hancock County District Attorney’s Office filed charges Wednesday against Jonathan Hayes, 17, of Bucksport in District Court in Ellsworth. Hayes is scheduled to make his first appearance in juvenile court on Friday.

Hayes and fellow student, Colton Crane, 17, are the members of the band Double S Rydas, who wrote and performed the songs on the CD, including “Shotgun Killing Spree,” which contained graphic descriptions of a shooting spree inside a high school. The song specifically mentioned the shooting of the principal and vice principal along with teachers and students. The lyrics made reference to Columbine High School, and, at the end of the song, to Bucksport High School.

Both boys already have been expelled from the school.

The terrorizing charge is warranted, according to Assistant District Attorney Mary Kellett, despite claims by some students that the two boys were simply exercising their right to free speech.

The threat of violence in the schools is very real these days considering what has happened in schools in other states and in other countries, according to Kellett. Just as making a bomb threat in a school is a crime, so is threatening violence in the school, whether or not the boys intended to act on that threat.

“This issue is that they made the threat; people thought it could happen and were frightened by it,” Kellett said Wednesday.

Although some students supported the two boys and indicated they were not upset by the lyrics, other students and their parents said the songs on the CD created a climate of fear in the school.

Crane also could face terrorizing charges. Kellett said that, under state law regarding juvenile crimes, she could not comment on the status of the charges against him.