BARTOW, FL—Florida State Attorneys have announced that they will not file felony charges against Kiera Wilmot, the 16-year-old Florida student arrested and escorted off school property after she conducted a science experiment that caused a water bottle to “pop” and “smoke.” The announcement by the Florida State Attorney’s office comes after a petition on Change.org calling for the charges to be dropped was signed by more than 195,000 people from across the country.
Wilmot reportedly mixed a household chemical with aluminum foil inside of a small water bottle for a science experiment in the hours before school began on April 22. No students were injured in the small explosion, and no school property was damaged, but the noise caught the attention of the school principal, who phoned the police. Wilmot was arrested and faced two felonies for “possession/discharge of a weapon on school grounds” and “discharging a destructive device.”
Maggie Gilman, the prevention education specialist in Oregon who led the campaign in defense of Wilmot, responded to the news.
“I’m so excited to hear that the charges against Kiera have been dropped and that she can now start to move on with her life,” says Gilman. “Even though I don’t have the privilege of knowing Kiera, I believe we all have the responsibility to stand up with one another whenever there is injustice and felt I had to do whatever I could to make sure the unjust felony charges were dropped. I’m very thankful to the 195,000 people who stood with Kiera and signed the petition on Change.org!”
Wilmot’s story also sparked a wave of support from scientists on Twitter, who took to the social media site to share their own stories about “about the things they blew up in the name of science” over the course of their careers. Popular Science blogger Andrew Thayer defended Wilmot amidst the controversy, writing: “Science is messy. Science in messiest when we just start learning how to turn our curiosity into something testable. For many people, high school is the time when we learn to harness that curiosity . . . High school programs should be nurturing that curiosity and fostering responsible experimentation, not punishing it.”
Megan Lubin is communications manager for Change.org.
