Parents and students of North Penn School District in North Wales, Pennsylvania, called out teachers and administrators after a transgender student, a biological male identifying as a female, brutally beat an unidentified middle school girl with a Stanley cup in the school cafeteria last week.
The victim was hit so severely that she was hospitalized due to a head injury.
Emily, a female student at Pennbrook Middle School and a friend of the victim, told the school board last Thursday that she was “second on his hit list” and recounted that she had begged for help from school officials numerous times before the attack.
“Wednesday morning, I went to the guidance counselor and told her, since I was second on the hit list, knowing that something was going to happen because there was a girl she was targeting every day at lunch. And they would go to the counselor and tell them every day that this is going to happen,” she said.
The student continued, “And Wednesday, I went with two others, and each of us filled out a whole paper full of what’s going to happen and why it’s going to happen.”
She shared that after reporting their concerns, she received a warning to “watch her back” because “he is going to come for you and the other girl at lunch.”
The student said she was “terrified” and told guidance counselor Colleen Fattori again about her concerns.
“I told Miss Fattori that that was happening and she said, ‘Don’t worry about it. It’s not going to happen,’” the student claimed the counselor said
The girl then described witnessing a bloody attack by the transgender student attacking her friend in the cafeteria.
“I was in lunch and all of the sudden, I hear all of this screaming and everybody running. And I see Mel running in after somebody, and everyone’s screaming and running,” she described the beginning of the incident.
She said the attacker went after the victim who was “faced backwards” and didn’t see the student coming up behind her.
“All of the sudden, you just hear these terrible, like, loud bangs of the Stanley bouncing off her head. And then you see Mel grabbing her hair and hitting her against the table, and just repeatedly hitting her with the Stanley,” the student told the school board.
She added, “There was blood going everywhere. I was at the table right behind and all you see is blood everywhere.”
The Pennbrook student shared that the seventh grade assailant repeatedly yelled, “I’m going to murder you” while hitting her friend’s head with the cup.
She grew tearful as she described seeing her friend’s blood being cleaned up off the tables and ground.
“We had to watch them take her out with blood dripping down her face and I will never forget that,” she cried.
She said the attack went on in front of the students for 28 minutes. However, the school district claims that security cameras revealed that the incident lasted eight minutes. At the school board meeting, the student disputed the school’s claim of “eight minutes” because she “timed it.” Parents at the meeting demanded to see the security tape to verify the claims of the school.
The middle school student said she laid awake in her bed that night upset that they “shouldn’t have had to” witness the attack.
“I don’t get it. You could have stopped it. It was five hours from when I told you it was going to happen… it was five whole hours. I don’t get how you couldn’t have stopped that,” she demanded at the board meeting.
She said the guidance counselor had assured her that the attack was “not going to happen” because they had the trans-identifying student “under control,” to which the student pointedly said to the school board, “Clearly, you didn’t.”
A Pennbrook student’s mother, Alyssa Santiago, confirmed to a local radio show that the violent student was known to be a biological male and there were yearbook photos of the student before transitioning to a transgender female.
The mother said the transgender student had been transferred to the school “two days” before the incident happened on Wednesday and by Tuesday, the students knew of a “hit list.”
“I would say by Tuesday lunch time, everybody in the school knew that my daughter was going to be ‘curb stomped’ or made to ‘bite the curb’ or jumped,” she said of the “school talk” prior to the attack.
Another mother told the school board that the transgender student “had multiple reports of violence” and she didn’t understand how that went unchecked.
“As a parent, your worst fear comes to light when you get that call from your kid crying, ‘Help, Mom! I’m scared. There’s blood everywhere!’ And you can’t get to them fast enough. And they hang up on you because teachers and staff are yelling at them to hang up their phones, not to call their parents,” she tearfully said to the board. “I told my child to always call me in an emergency no matter what.”
The mother demanded that the board assure her that this student does not return to their school because this is “not the student’s first violent attack.”
She recounted how parents from numerous other local schools have dealt with this student’s “documented violence,” both in and out of school. The mother claimed that the student had violently attacked another student in an elementary school.
During the meeting, School Superintendent Todd Bauer called the attack “deeply disturbing.”
“This was avoidable and the district truly failed to protect the students at Pennbrook,” a parent said. “What are we supposed to say to our children after this? How do I send him back to school?”
Nick Taylor, Pennbrook Middle School principal, sent a letter to parents saying that, “the safety of our students is of the utmost importance… I ask that parents speak with their children about the consequences of fighting.”
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Pennbrook parent Stephanie Palovcak clapped back at the principal’s comment.
“This isn’t a fight. This is an assault,” Palovcak said.
