<p>Pushing someone is assault and battery under most jurisdictions I know of. </p>
<p>Yelling in some cases can be considered part of disorderly conduct and/or disturbing the peace. </p>
<p>Knowledge gained from watching police in action in my old NYC neighborhood, having some cop friends including a childhood softball coach, and from reading.</p>
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<p>Even at my then unusually generous Catholic elementary school, the student/parent(s) only got two warnings for such serious bullying behavior before said student got booted permanently from the school. Most other schools only provided one or sometimes even no prior warning as they expected students/parents to fully understand the high behavioral standards and agree to be held accountable to them as part of their enrollment agreement beforehand. </p>
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<p>Actually, if the school found the 12 year old in question continues and escalates her out of control violent bullying behavior to a serious point, cops can and have been called in even back when I attended junior high. </p>
<p>Heh, those 12-14 year old future felons were regulars at the nearby local police station. The cops wanted to do more. Unfortunately those bullies’ parents and “one must understand the bullies” loopy teachers/admins did their utmost to shelter them from the true consequences of their criminal behavior. </p>
<p>Too bad for those future felons that the sheltering was no longer adequate once they escalated their crimes to the point the cops had more than enough grounds to have them arrested as juvenile delinquents in high school and/or sent to Rikers/upstate to do serious time.</p>
<p>Some of the bullying (maybe all of it, the stories aren’t clear) may have occurred outside of school, so police intervention would be appropriate.</p>
<p>Most private schools I know of in the NYC area reserve the right to regulate student behavior in and outside of school as a condition of enrollment. Two girls in my 6th grade Catholic elementary school class were suspended for a week and had to serve detention afterwards for fighting each other in a park on a weekend. </p>
<p>They were also made to be paraded in shame in front of the entire student body at lunchtime while the ASST principal announced their offense and asked them “Aren’t you ashamed of yourselves?”.</p>
<p>I still don’t understand. Private schools can kick out students; the schools I know would expel a student so out of control and bullying others. </p>
<p>I also don’t understand why the parents of the victim would continue to send their child to a private school which could not assure their child’s safety. When a child talks to a parent about thinking about suicide, the parent has to act. You are not required to send your child to a private school.</p>
<p>It may be the only good private school which is the right academic fit for a given child. It’s also a form of victim blaming to take this particular path IMO. </p>
<p>Parents should be demanding that the private school expel the bully and/or involve the police if needed. Behaving in a bullying manner…especially if it gets to the point of getting the police involved should result in automatic expulsion of the bully after the bullying has been established by school and/or local authorities.</p>
<p>The parents did act. They talked to the school, and then apparently they called the police. I don’t see why a parent should have to choose between allowing their child to be criminally assaulted, and taking their child out of school, if there is a third choice.</p>
<p>If my kid were getting assaulted, and his school wasn’t stopping the assault, I’d want the attacker to be arrested.</p>
<p>I am not blaming the victim. Some problems (such as your child telling you he/she is contemplating suicide) are more urgent than “the right academic fit,” or “the good academic school.” In such a situation, any school is better. Leaving the bullies behind will often solve the problem. </p>
<p>There’s a difference between a child not being happy due to bullying, in which case a parent can try to make the school do the right thing by disciplining or dismissing the bully, and your child talking of suicide. In the latter case, the child’s welfare must take priority.</p>
<p>Cobrat - when you hear “Officer Krupke” doesn’t it bring a tear to your eye, thinking about the good ol’ days in school.</p>
<p>Seriously, this conduct if done by an adult would constitute assault and the only reason that this girl was probably not charged with that is because of her age. If you doubt that, think of the recent case where a man was charged with assault (or something similar) for grabbing the shoulder of Dick Cheney so he could yell in his face. I have no problem with the school contacting the police and I would be willing to bet that some attempt was made to resolve this before the police were called.</p>
<p>Zoosermom: in the worst stories to reach the press, bullies rarely act alone. Disciplining, suspending or expelling one bully might not solve the problem. That child’s friends might blame the victim; they might shun or bully the victim. There’s much more to this story than we know.</p>
<p>Or they turned 18 and had to face the adult criminal justice system and prisons instead of the juvenile criminal justice system and juvenile halls. If the latter is very lenient, then it fails to serve as either a deterrent or a means to keep them from harming others in the future, no matter how many times the police bring in the under-18 miscreant.</p>
<p>I’m thinking it’s more likely there’s also the factor of negligent parents sheltering her and possibly her gender making her seem less of a threat to TPTB.</p>
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<p>Funny part is that if one commits enough felonies or they were severe enough, one can be tried and sentence as if one was an adult if one was in latter traditional HS ages. Some of those future felons entered the adult system due to felonies committed as 15-17 year olds.</p>
<p>They allowed the girl back?
The 12-year-old girl will undergo counseling.
“If she doesn’t stop she’ll be arrested again or she’ll be thrown out of school,” Hohn said.
Sounds like a stiff reprimand…her parents must be well connected. Hohn is the police chief.</p>
<p>Not only well connected, the senior staff and head of school must be populated by those like the loopy “bullies must be understood” types I encountered at my middle school…</p>
<p>I’m conflicted since this seemingly involved a physical attack but I do not support criminalizing words. I think many of the criminal anti-bullying laws are unconstitutional.</p>
<p>My friend knew a girl who was on scholarship years ago at a private school, have no idea about this young woman. She was bullied, the bully was rich…they didn’t want to lose the full freight tuition but it got bad enough…the mental torture, even with words, the threats when parents got involved, (not in public) were awful.
No one should make you that miserable, you go to school to learn and to learn to get along, bully’s are insecure and want control, they might need therapy or a good firm parent, but no one should have to put up with that on a daily basis.</p>
<p>In the world outside of a classroom, harassment without physical violence can be criminal. I’m thinking specifically of stalking laws. Do you believe those laws are also unconsitutional?</p>
<p>Just as importantly, it’s not the problem of the bullied victims and shouldn’t be made such by the bullies, their parents, and clueless teachers/admins. </p>
<p>In fact, teachers even bringing up the fact the bullies “need to be understood” can be a form of additional victimization on those already bullied…especially if their BS detector hasn’t been sufficiently developed to realize what a crock bringing it up with them actually is…</p>
<p>^^^All too often, it is the bullied child who is told they need to get counseling or is advised to leave the school, which I find offensive and, as you stated, constitutes additional victimization. </p>
<p>Bullies are the ones who need counseling to help them figure out why their insecurities compel them to victimize others. I think intervention should come very early, not after they have already resorted to violence. At that point, they should be expelled.</p>