Boy sues school for suspending him after making gun out of Dr Pepper cans off-campus

A Missouri mom and her teenage son are suing his school for suspending him after he made a gun out of Dr Pepper cans off-campus and posted it on Snapchat.

In 2024, a 13-year-old boy glued a bunch of Dr Pepper cans together into the shape of a rifle as part of a viral “can art” trend.

According to Reason, once the boy, referred to as “W.G” for legal purposes, had finished the project, he posted it to Snapchat to share with his friends.

This photo was seen by a parent of another student at the school who reported it. The next day, W.G’s mother, Riley Grunden, received a call from the principal alerting her that her son would be subject to a search before entering the school premises.

Grunden ended up meeting with school officials the following day, including the principal and superintendent, who informed her that her son would be suspended for three days for “cyberbullying,” saying the Snapchat post “brought fear to other students.”

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School sued for suspending student for off-campus Dr Pepper gun can art

The suspension, along with the cyberbully label, was enough for a lawsuit to be filed against The Mountain View-Birch Tree R-III School District by the Goldwater Institute’s American Freedom Network on April 10, 2025.

“This is unconscionable — my son never hurt or threatened a single person. Instead of using common sense, our own school district treated my child like a criminal for arranging empty soda cans in a way they didn’t like,” Riley Grunden explained.

The Goldwater Institute further stated that the school district found “no credible evidence of any danger,” but decided to suspend W.G anyway.

“The constitutional violations in this case are clear. The U.S. Supreme Court’s 2021 decision in Mahanoy Area School District v. B.L. established that schools have limited authority to regulate off-campus speech,” they argued.

As part of the lawsuit, they’re seeking to have W.G’s record cleared, because it may affect his ability to gain admission to top colleges and universities, as well as prevent other students from experiencing a similar situation.

This isn’t the first time a family has filed a lawsuit against a school over a suspension they believe is unjust. In 2023, a family of a 17-year-old filed a federal civil rights lawsuit after his school suspended him for his hairstyle.