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NOPE
Medium reported severity Media Coverage

Den Bosch: 13-year-old made racist Grok videos of his teacher; the school expelled him and a court ordered his readmission

In March 2026 a 13-year-old pupil at a Den Bosch gymnasium used xAI's Grok to generate videos depicting a teacher of his in racist ways — picking cotton under a whip-holding slave driver with the text 'Hoooo.. ik werkte niet snel genoeg' and hashtags '#minderwaardig #zwart' plus her surname, and with a gorilla head — and shared them on TikTok. The school suspended and then expelled him. On 8 July 2026 the preliminary-relief judge of the Oost-Brabant district court ordered his immediate readmission because the expulsion was insufficiently substantiated, while telling the boy his acts were 'totally unacceptable and even criminal' and that he had damaged and really hurt his teacher. School leadership reported that teaching staff felt unsafe and experienced much unrest after the videos were discovered.

AI system
Grok
xAI
Occurred
1 Mar 2026 to 8 Jul 2026
Reported
8 July 2026
Event location
Netherlands
What the AI did
Depicted or impersonated the person
Reported harm
Psychological DistressReputational Harm
Whose AI use
Someone else’s AI use
Setting
Education · Work
Evidence
AI involvement supported · Causal attribution supported · 2 sources
4 claims: 3 corroborated, 1 reported. 5 open questions
People reported harmed
At least 1 person

What Happened

The boy, repeating his first year at a Den Bosch gymnasium, made several videos with GrokAI and shared them in March 2026 via TikTok. Nine screenshots from the since-deleted videos were in the court file; the judge held that part of the screenshots definitely came from the AI videos the boy made. The school confronted him and he admitted making them; his parents say he deleted the videos himself after a day and a half. The school suspended him and later expelled him definitively, arguing that calm, order and safety were seriously affected and that staff no longer felt safe, also citing a pattern of earlier incidents. The parents went to court; they dispute that their son made all the videos (the file includes images made by another pupil) and dispute the earlier-incidents pattern, while acknowledging the impact the racist videos could have had on the teacher. The voorzieningenrechter of rechtbank Oost-Brabant ruled on 8 July 2026 that the expulsion was insufficiently underpinned — no statements substantiating the school-wide unsafety, no explanation why another pupil involved was not expelled, the earlier incidents contradicted and insufficiently concrete, and too little weight given to the boy's age (13) and his repeated offers to apologise — and ordered immediate readmission. In the ruling the judge addressed the boy directly: what he did was 'totally unacceptable and even criminal' (volkomen onaanvaardbaar en zelfs strafbaar), and with the videos he had 'not only damaged his teacher, but possibly also others who saw the videos and felt hurt by them, and really hurt them'. The NOS report adds that the hashtags included '#minderwaardig #zwart' and a hashtag with the teacher's surname, and that one screenshot carried the text 'Een dag in mijn leven als minderwaardig persoon'. Neither the boy nor the teacher is named in the inspected reporting; the teacher's surname is not reproduced here.

Reported harm

According to NOS and Omroep Brabant reporting of the court file and the school's account, the targeted teacher was hurt and damaged by racist AI-generated videos shared at her school, and teaching staff felt unsafe and experienced unrest; the judge described her harm directly in the ruling.

How Harm Occurred

A pupil used a generative video tool to produce racist depictions of a named-role teacher and circulated them in the school community via TikTok; the harm arises from the generated artifacts and their distribution, not from a chatbot interaction with the harmed person.

Outcome

Resolved

Preliminary-relief ruling, rechtbank Oost-Brabant, 8 July 2026: expulsion insufficiently substantiated; immediate readmission ordered; the judge called the videos shocking and the boy's acts 'totally unacceptable and even criminal', and noted his age and apology offers. No criminal or further disciplinary proceeding is reported in the inspected sources.

What remains unknown

  • Exact creation and sharing dates within March 2026 are not stated in the inspected reporting.
  • Which images were made by the other pupil, and whether that pupil was disciplined, is unresolved; the judge noted the school could not explain why the other pupil was not expelled.
  • No criminal complaint or further disciplinary proceeding is reported; the judge's 'criminal' characterisation is a moral finding in a civil summary procedure.
  • The teacher's situation after the ruling (return, support measures) is not reported.
  • The boy's prompts and Grok's generation settings are not reported; only the outputs in the court file are documented.

What the evidence supports

AI involvement: supported. The videos were made with Grok: the boy admitted making them after the school confronted him (Omroep Brabant), and the court file's nine screenshots were held by the judge to come partly from the AI videos he made (NOS). The harm flows from the artifacts and their sharing; what the tool generated is documented through the court file, while the prompting process is not reported.

4 claims: 3 corroborated, 1 reported. What the statuses mean

Corroborated According to NOS and Omroep Brabant, a 13-year-old pupil at a Den Bosch gymnasium made several videos with Grok and shared them in March 2026 via TikTok; the videos depicted his teacher picking cotton under a whip-holding slave driver with the text 'Hoooo.. ik werkte niet snel genoeg', with hashtags '#minderwaardig #zwart' and her surname, and with a gorilla head; one screenshot read 'Een dag in mijn leven als minderwaardig persoon'.

Causal attribution. The judge held that part of the screenshots definitely came from the AI videos the boy made; the parents dispute that he made all of them (the file includes another pupil's images). Grok's role as the generation tool is admitted by the boy and unchallenged in the inspected reporting.

  • nos.nl(opens in new tab) supports · Dutch
    Paragraphs 4-6: 'In het rechtbankdossier zaten negen screenshots... de docente is afgebeeld terwijl zij katoen plukt... slavendrijver die een zweep vasthoudt... #minderwaardig #zwart, en een hashtag met de achternaam van de betreffende docente... het hoofd van een gorilla... Een dag in mijn leven als minderwaardig persoon'.
  • omroepbrabant.nl(opens in new tab) supports · Dutch
    'De jongen maakte met GrokAI enkele filmpjes en deelde die in maart via TikTok... in een veld waar zij katoen plukt... met het hoofd van een gorilla'; the school confronted him and he admitted making them.
Corroborated The teacher was harmed: the judge told the boy he had 'not only damaged his teacher, but possibly also others who saw the videos and felt hurt by them, and really hurt them', and school leadership reported that teaching staff felt unsafe and experienced much unrest after the discovery.

Causal attribution. Harm is attributed to the videos and their circulation, as found in the ruling and the school's account; the Brabants Dagblad headline ('Lerares diep geraakt...') is consistent but its body could not be inspected.

  • nos.nl(opens in new tab) supports · Dutch
    Judge's direct address quoted near the ruling's end: 'Met de filmpjes heb je niet alleen jouw docente, maar mogelijk ook anderen die de filmpjes hebben gezien en zich erdoor gekwetst voelen, beschadigd en echt pijn gedaan'; school passages: 'gevoelens van onrust en onveiligheid' among teachers.
  • omroepbrabant.nl(opens in new tab) supports · Dutch
    'Onderwijspersoneel voelde zich na de ontdekking volgens de school niet meer veilig en ervaarde veel onrust'; parents acknowledge the impact the videos could have had on the teacher.
Corroborated The school suspended and then expelled the boy; on 8 July 2026 the Oost-Brabant preliminary-relief judge ordered immediate readmission because the expulsion was insufficiently substantiated, while calling the videos shocking and the boy's acts 'totally unacceptable and even criminal'.

Causal attribution. The ruling's procedural finding (insufficient substantiation) and its moral finding (unacceptable, criminal) are both reported in full by two inspected outlets.

  • nos.nl(opens in new tab) supports · Dutch
    Opening and ruling paragraphs: expulsion, parents' lawsuit, readmission ordered; 'volkomen onaanvaardbaar en zelfs strafbaar'; judge's weight given to age 13.
  • omroepbrabant.nl(opens in new tab) supports · Dutch
    Ruling paragraphs: school 'onvoldoende heeft onderbouwd'; readmission 'per direct'; judge calls the videos 'shockerend'; apology offers and the boy's interests weighed.
Reported The parents dispute that their son made all the videos in the file and dispute the school's pattern of earlier incidents; they say he deleted the videos himself after a day and a half and was never allowed to apologise to the teacher.

Causal attribution. The judge found the earlier-incidents pattern contradicted and insufficiently concrete; authorship of the remaining screenshots is unresolved.

  • omroepbrabant.nl(opens in new tab) supports · Dutch
    'Ouders niet mee eens' and 'Geen kans op herstel' sections: another pupil's images in the file; presence and role at earlier incidents disputed; contact with the teacher forbidden.
  • nos.nl(opens in new tab) context · Dutch
    Parents' account: deletion after a day and a half, not only after confrontation; earlier incidents disputed; no chance to make amends.

Sources

2 sources inspected. Sources that repeat one account do not corroborate each other.

How the sources were read, and where the events happened

Read in Dutch on 2026-09-15 (datePublished 2026-07-08T23:01+0200). Quotes in the public record are close paraphrase from the Dutch; model translation, no human reviewer. Applies to s1.

Read in Dutch on 2026-09-15 (datePublished 2026-07-08T13:45Z; bylined Evie Hendriks). Model translation, no human reviewer. Applies to s2.

Brabants Dagblad blocked by the DPG Media WAF (403) direct and via reader proxy on 2026-09-15; headline seen verbatim in Google News RSS ('Lerares diep geraakt door racistische AI-filmpjes van leerling (13)'). Body not inspected; language not established. Applies to s3.

Event countries: Netherlands. Affected-person countries: Netherlands. Court countries: Netherlands.

Event: a Den Bosch gymnasium and TikTok sharing by its pupil (both outlets). Affected person: the teacher at that school. Court: rechtbank Oost-Brabant preliminary-relief judge, 8 July 2026.

Reviewed for publication 2026-09-15: Published under the 2026-09-15 charter as a harmful-artifact case: a named-role adult was the target of racist AI-generated videos made with Grok and shared in her school community, documented through court-file reporting by two independently inspected Dutch outlets. The perpetrator is a minor and the teacher is unnamed in the sources; neither is named here, and the teacher's surname (present in one hashtag) is not reproduced.

People described

A teacher (woman, unnamed) at a Den Bosch gymnasium, depicted in the AI-generated videos; school teaching staff reported feeling unsafe

People reported harmed in this case

At least 1 person

0 AI participants · 1 other person harmed

One documented harmed person: the teacher, whose hurt is described in the ruling itself ('you have damaged your teacher... and really hurt her', per the NOS account) and in the school's account of staff feeling unsafe. The judge's 'possibly also others who saw the videos and felt hurt' is not quantified and is not counted. The boy, a minor and the AI user, is not counted as harmed: the expelled-then-readmitted consequence was reversed and flows from his own act.

Counted once within this case. The same person may appear in other cases. This count does not establish AI causation.

Tags

#education#deepfake#harassment#racism#minor-perpetrator#grok#netherlands

Cite this case

Compiled per our published methodology: verification statuses, sourcing standards, and corrections process.

APA

NOPE. (2026). Den Bosch: 13-year-old made racist Grok videos of his teacher; the school expelled him and a court ordered his readmission. AI incidents. https://nope.net/incidents/2026-den-bosch-grok-racist-videos-teacher

BibTeX

@misc{2026_den_bosch_grok_racist_videos_teacher,
  title = {Den Bosch: 13-year-old made racist Grok videos of his teacher; the school expelled him and a court ordered his readmission},
  author = {NOPE},
  year = {2026},
  howpublished = {AI incidents},
  url = {https://nope.net/incidents/2026-den-bosch-grok-racist-videos-teacher}
}

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