Texas teenager arrested over homemade clock teachers mistook for a bomb

AHMED Mohamed, a 14-year-old Texas schoolboy, was arrested by the police after teachers thought a homemade clock he had taken to show them was actually a bomb.

The boy, reported to be very bright and enthusiastic, had made the clock and taken it to MacArthur High School in Irving to proudly show his engineering teacher, but another teacher confiscated it after hearing it beep during a lesson.

Later that day Ahmad was called out of class and interviewed by the headteacher and four police officers, who reportedly asked what else the clock could be used for although the boy insisted it was nothing more.

Although the school refused to comment apart from stating that students and staff were always asked to report suspicious items and behaviour, the boy’s father and the Council on American-Islamic Relations suspect he was treated unfairly because of his name and Muslim background.

His father, Mohamed Elhassan Mohamed, originally from Sudan, said: “He just wants to invent good things for mankind but because his name is Mohamed and because of 11 September I think he was mistreated.”