Students at Stuyvesant High School are some of New York’s brightest, but they’re still capable of stupid stunts. At an October 7 junior-varsity football practice, two sophomore players became violently ill after drinking Gatorade spiked with copper sulfate, a chemical fungicide stolen from a chemistry classroom by a sophomore teammate. Police were called to the squad’s Pier 40 practice field, where they arrested the alleged prankster and charged him with reckless endangerment, a misdemeanor. One player was hospitalized after coughing up blood, though both recovered for the homecoming game three days later. A Department of Education spokesman said the offending student received a two-week suspension; the school’s principal, Stanley Teitel, wouldn’t comment. Six other players who knew of the scheme and didn’t stop it were suspended from the team, according to a student-newspaper account. Paola de Kock, co-president of the school’s parents’ association, said she was dumbfounded by the kids’ boneheadedness. “You’d think,” she said, “they could muster the collective IQ to figure out it was not a good idea.”
Have good intel? Send tips to intel@nymag.com.