Tennessee teen kills himself after classmate outed him as gay and shared his private texts on social media, family seeks justice
MANCHESTER, TENNESSEE: The family of 16-year old Channing Smith wants justice after he committed suicide when a friend outed him online as being gay.
Smith's body was discovered on Sunday, September 29, at his Manchester, Tennessee, home. The family said he was outed by a classmate following a disagreement between the two.
This resulted in the latter posting screenshots of explicit texts between Smith and another boy. Smith had not told his family members that he identified as LGBTQ+.
His brother Joshua referred to him as "gay or bisexual" in an interview with Daily Mail. He also added the family "would have accepted him no matter what" and called him "the sweetest kid ever."
Smith's mother Crystal added her son's death was a reminder that "posting one little picture can destroy somebody's life."
In an interview with WKRN, the local TV news station, she said, "You can't understand it. How somebody could be that mean to somebody just for the fun of it? It doesn't make any sense."
"I can't describe the pain," she explained. Joshua, in his interview, said while the student responsible for posting the images shouldn't be "brought up on murder charges," he believes some responsibility should be taken.
"[T]here is harassment and manslaughter," he told the Daily Mail, "there are different levels that could happen."
Talking about the incident, Coffee County District Attorney Craig Northcott did not state whether he would be pressing charges or not against the young person who outed Smith. However, Smith's family said they were told he does not intend to move forward with prosecution.
In a public statement, Northcott claimed he is "prohibited from commenting on an open investigation or prosecution."
He added: "However, procedurally, no charging decisions have been made by my office nor has the Coffee County Sheriff’s Department asked for a decision since the investigation has not been completed."
Northcott, however, expressed his "heartfelt condolences to his family" and said he is "deeply saddened by the tragic loss."
According to Out, Northcott has faced criticism previously for his anti-LGBTQ+ views. In a 2018 video, he said that he refuses to enforce Tennessee’s domestic violence laws in cases of intimate partner violence between same-sex spouses because he doesn’t "recognize it as marriage".
"The reason that there's enhanced punishment on domestic violence is to recognize and protect the sanctity of marriage," Northcott said, adding: "There's no marriage to protect."