Student Found Delinquent Of Threats Judge To Decide Fate Of Crestwood High School Student Jared Mellas, Who Also Was Found Delinquent Of Possessing A Knife On School Property.

By JOE SYLVESTER Times Leader Staff Writer
Tuesday, December 21, 1999 Page: 1A

WILKES-BARRE – Jared Mellas didn’t plan to kill the two black classmates he
threatened in a Nov. 29 Internet conversation, according to testimony Monday
during his Luzerne County Juvenile Court hearing.

“As I said kill, I meant it to mean beat up,” Mellas said, adding later,
“I had no intention of killing anyone or hurting anyone.
“I feel very sorry for what I did and if I hurt anybody’s feelings.”

Judge Mark Ciavarella found Mellas, 14, delinquent on charges of
terroristic threats and possessing a knife on school property. Mellas, a
Crestwood School District student, was cleared of an ethnic intimidation
charge because he did not make the threats directly to the boys.

The judge sent Mellas to the county Juvenile Detention Center, where he
will undergo a psychological evaluation. After the tests, which could take
several days, the judge will decide Mellas’ fate.

The Crestwood eighth-grader who chatted with Mellas Nov. 29 in a private
Internet chat room testified she downloaded and printed the conversation
because Mellas threatened to kill her two black friends.

“He said he wasn’t getting along with them and he wanted to kill them,”
the 14-year-old girl told the court.

The transcript was littered with racial slurs from Mellas – known as
“Entersandman7” – and expletives written by the girl and Mellas. In the
transcript, Mellas wrote, “My friends and myself plan to kill all the niggers
and anyone else who wants to f— with us.”

When the girl asked Mellas during the chat who else he planned to kill, he
said they included eighth-graders and high school upperclassmen.

In the transcript, Mellas said one of the victims rode and broke Mellas’
bicycle at the Wright Township Park recently. “One nigger tried to wreck and
steal my bike; the other was just born.”

The girl responded by saying: “F— you. Burn baby, burn. You’re going to
die.”

Mellas wrote, “They will die.”

At another point in the transcript, Mellas wrote, “They aren’t white; they
aren’t right.”

The girl said she printed the conversation and took it to school two days
later to show to a friend. The transcript was eventually passed to one of the
two boys who was allegedly threatened.

“I printed it out because he made threats to my friends,” she testified.
“I thought somebody else should know about it.”

When the judge asked her if she thought Mellas would carry out his threats,
she replied, “Possibly.” But she didn’t immediately give the transcript to
an adult because of some of the things she wrote.

One of the victims, a 13-year-old boy, testified that he felt threatened by
Mellas’ comments because he had threatened to kill him. He said he saw the
transcript on Dec. 2 and showed it to his father and the other victim, who is


The 14-year-old boy told the court his father went to the school the next
morning to talk to school officials.

“I was scared to go to school,” he testified. “I thought I was going to
get beat up.”

He denied damaging Mellas’ bike and said another boy stomped on a wheel.

Without giving details, Mellas mentioned an incident during his testimony
in which he was pushed into his locker the day before he brought the knife to
school. “I went to my older friends to watch my back.”

Wright Township Police Chief Joseph M. Jacob, whose department investigated
the threats, said Mellas admitted to sending the Internet message. Jacob said
Mellas told him he had visited a Ku Klux Klan Web site about five times.

“He said he does believe in their views on blacks, but not so much on
other minorities,” Jacob said.

After the testimony, Ciavarella lectured those present and called the
Internet transcript “trash.

“If this is the best and the brightest our community has and this is how
our children interact ... we’re in deep trouble,” he said.

Ciavarella said the slurs in the transcript showed a lack of sensitivity
and responsibility.

“If we teach our children to hate other children, we’re no better than
Nazi Germany,” he said. “Nobody in this courtroom should feel good about
what’s going on in this community.”

The hearing included arguments about whether the state wiretap law applies
to Internet conversations. Defense attorney Joseph Yeager of Forty Fort argued
the Internet conversation transcript should be suppressed because there was no
prior consent for it to be downloaded, printed and distributed, the same way a
telephone call cannot be tape-recorded without consent.

Assistant District Attorney Paula Radick said the Internet is unlike the
telephone in that there is a risk a conversation will be intercepted.

The Crestwood School Board voted unanimously last Thursday evening to expel
Mellas for the remainder of the school year for the weapon possession.

Joe Sylvester covers education. Reach him at 829-7219.