This was too halarious for me to pass up :D

http://www.cnn.com/2004/US/Northeast/06/11/teacher.soap.ap/index.html

From what I can tell, the little bastard probably needed it

I think there's a direct correlation between this story and the one regarding the seven students arrested for the food fight.

I dont see the real problem mentioned here. The parents of the child, sure kids can be brought up in a good environment and have an outburst or two, but not a continuous problem like this child.
I agree he deserved it, but maybe it should have been his parents or maybe the teacher could have called the parents in, talked about the issues and then placed the child and parents on a probationary program. If he does it again then one of the parents would have to attend class with him for a week.
Or maybe washing his mouth out will work very well.