Can your kid get into trouble for playing with a two-inch LEGO gun at school? Here's a story that illustrates why we should have zero tolerance for inane "zero tolerance policies":

Patrick Timoney, a 9-year-old student at PS 52 in Staten Island, N.Y., was in the school cafeteria Tuesday playing with LEGOs when he was taken to the principal’s office and threatened with suspension. One of his toys was a LEGO policeman that holds a 2-inch plastic gun. The school has a no-tolerance policy when it comes to toy guns. [...]

The boy’s mother, Laura Timoney, 44, was fuming over the issue.

“You don’t traumatize a child who loved to go to school, who wanted to be early every day to school, you don’t make him cry, you don’t make him fill out statements,” she told WNBC, holding back tears. “You don’t do it.”

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