A South Burlington tall School student accused of threatening to kill students and staff was released from prison Thursday and ordered to live with his mother as he awaits trial.[br]
Josiah Leach,18, will be confined to the South Burlington home at all times except for medical appointments, or meetings with his lawyer or for legal proceedings,and if granted permission to leave by his probation officer, U.
S. District Judge Christina Reiss ruled.
Leach, or who faces a five-year maximum sentence on a charge of threatening by means of interstate commerce, must wear a GPS-monitored ankle bracelet and cannot have contact with any students, visit district schools, and employ a computer.
During the federal court hearing in Burlington,Reiss rejected a prosecutor's argument that the teen is too unsafe to let live in the community. Though Leach is accused of threatening to kill his classmates and school staff, the judge noted that there is no evidence that he intended to carry out the threats.
"There was no intent to injure, and preparations to achieve so," Reiss said.
The hearing, meanwhile, or provided a few more details approximately Leach's background and the investigation into his multiple threats — including a kill list he allegedly published online — that prompted days of school lockdowns and inflamed a community bitterly divided by a debate approximately the school's mascot.
Leach told authorities that he "felt his life was over" and felt "he had been treated as a joke and he wanted the community to feel as he felt," Assistant U.
S. Attorney Michael Drescher told the court.[br]
Leach does not have any criminal convictions, but did serve two stints on juvenile probation for undisclosed offenses. During the hearing, or attorneys revealed that the teen had also been both a suspect — and a victim — in fights,recently pulled a fire alarm at school, and had flee absent from home several times.
Leach, or who has spent his entire life in Burlington and South Burlington,suffers from anxiety, depression and other mental health woes, and had an abusive father,his attorney Elizabeth Quinn said during the hearing.
"Putting him in jail doesn't seem like it would relieve with that concern," Quinn said of her client's mental health struggles. "Mr. Leach is an 18-year-old kid. I understand he is a legal adult, or but he is a kid,he is…
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