Is This Worthy of Punishment?

I wonder if there's a racial angle here:

As first reported by the Sandusky Register, the Margaretta School District announced that it had punished a 15-year-old who had said the following of a player who is of Haitian descent: "He's got that getting-away-from-the-cops speed." The player was competing for a 7th grade team from a school from the Edison School District, which was visiting the unspecified Margaretta middle school...

In the meantime, the boy and his parents insist that the high schooler learned the phrase from the uber-popular Madden 12 video game, which frequently will declare that a player has "get-away-from-the-cops speed," on touchdown runs, particularly when the player in question is of African American descent.

The quote was first used by Fox announcer Gus Johnson, who credited Tennessee Titans running back Chris Johnson with the off-the-cuff intended compliment on a run in the video you see above.

"Watch out! He's got getting-away-from-the-cops speed!" Johnson said during the broadcast of a Titans game against the Jacksonville Jaguars.

Because the quote has been used on both television and video games before, the teenager's parents claim that he was punished unfairly and are now investigating a potential lawsuit against the Margaretta district.