Teens Suspended For Posing With Airsoft Rifles In Homecoming Photo

Bristol-Plymouth Regional Technical School told the students they should have known better.

Tito Velez and Jamie Pereira, both 16, took a photo together before heading off to their homecoming dance last Friday. They posed with their airsoft guns.

"We wanted something unique and different instead of using flowers like everyone else," Velez told local reporters. Velez and Pereira shoot airsoft rifles together on the weekends.

Students were talking about the photo in the hallways. School officials deemed it a "disturbance" and suspended the two. "They should have known better. You have Newtown, you have what just recently happened," Superintendent Richard Gross said.

The pair got a 10 day suspension, but the superintendent has said there will be a hearing to determine if and when Velez and Pereira could return to school.

Pereira and Velez believe the suspension is ridiculous. Pereira said on her Twitter account that the guns in the photos were clearly labeled as airsoft rifles.

Just so idiots can understand, we weren't joking over a school shooting. Airsoft is a hobby we included in our pictures.

Also, it's not okay to have my constitutional rights violated over a picture.

@mylittlememow @KourtneyWhite2 and in the comments we said they were airsoft guns so

The school board for Broken Bow Public Schools in Nebraska last week made news last week when they unanimously voted to allow students to pose with firearms in yearbook photos.

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