I am in Massachusetts and we have received a notice in the mail to appear in court for a complaint aginst him for Malicious Destruction of Property over $250. The property is school windows. The story is below:

Two of my kids freinds were walking down our street, I told my daughter (14)they were here as it looked as if they were coming to our house to see a kitten that they were supposed to be taking. They were not coming to our house they were walking nervously around, but my daughter talked to them anyway. During the conversation with my daughter they informed her that thier cousin had just broken a window at the elementry school by our house. My son (13) joined them, but had not been told about the windows. They had all asked if they could go for a walk (our daughters biggest mistake), and we said sure (not knowing what our daughter had just been told). While on the walk they met up with another friend of my daughter (15). During the walk they all decided to go up to the school, where the two boys decided to throw more rocks at windows. My daughter and her friend pulled my son away and left the area. The two boys left also. They came home and we were told about the incident. The next day they came back but were told to leave, they stole a next door neighbors sledge hammer and broke more windos. We decided to leave it alone because we were afraid that these kids would try to point fingers at my kids (our big mistake). The janitor of the school who lives across the street form the school who also knows my kids very well saw them going up there that day with the other kids, so he was able to point the police to my kids. The police went to my kids school and pulled them out of class seperately and listened to thier story. The officer took down my daughter's statement only, but told them both that thier stories matched. I also that same week spoke to the officer and he told me the same thing, that thier stories matched and that they shouldn't be in any trouble, worst case scenario (trespassing). That following week the officer called the parents of the other kids and left a message on their phone telling them only a portion of what was going on. The mother called my wife and my wife explained what was going, (our second mistake), this mother is not all there and has a bunch of kids with a bunch of different fathers but only has custody of one, so they now had a heads up and time to get the stories together between the two brothers. The brothers were questioned and can you imagine thier stories matched as well which was that my son broke windows as well. The police never questioned my daughters other freind that they met up with on the way to the school.

Now because the brothers story matched they are bringing the complaint against my son as well.

I have given my son every oppurtunity to say yes I did it, as well as my daughter to say yeah he did it. I also spoke to my daughters friend and the story matched what they have said. They other problem is I do not think my son could even hit the windows, they were gymnasium windows at like a third story height. My son is not the most (sportiest) of kids if you catch my drift, and he does have dextarity (not quite sure of the spelling) problems. He is seen regularly by an occupation therapist at school for issues he has. I'm not saying he couldn't I just don't think he could. I'm not being the my kid is an angel parent either. We have trust in our kids and they have trust in us, and by this time one of them would have told us if it had happened.

I plan on fighting this, but I certainly could use some good guidance, and I certainly cannot afford a lawyer, unless I absolutely have to if it goes past the complaint stage.

Any words of advice or guidance would be gladly appreciated.