OH - Gabriel Taye, 8, hangs self after assault by classmates, Cincinnati, 6 Jan 2017

This is heartbreaking.

A security camera video taken inside a Cincinnati elementary school reveals that a student assaulted an 8-year-old boy in a restroom and other children may have kicked and struck the boy for 5 minutes while he lay unconscious.

Two days later, the child, Gabriel Taye, hanged himself.

In a report obtained by The Cincinnati Enquirer, a Cincinnati Police homicide detective describes the Jan. 24 Carson Elementary School video’s content: “I witnessed behavior that in my belief is bullying and could even rise to the level of criminal assault” if not for the young ages of the perpetrators.

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<snip> https://www.usatoday.com/story/news...eaten-kicked-kills-himself/317441001/?ref=yfp

Poor Gabriel. I'm astonished that the behavior of the boy who instigated the attack had not been previously addressed, IMO. No behavior program, psychological counseling? Yet all of the kids in the school appeared to be in fear of him.

When the Vice Principal realized what was happening, he rushed into the restroom to help Gabriel. I'm curious whether another child reported the incident to office staff, or if someone in the school office observed what was happening on surveillance. Why did it take so long? The first article says Gabe was assaulted for 5 min after he was knocked unconscious. The 2nd article (below) says he was unconscious 7½ min.

The Hamilton County coroner wants to reopen the investigation.

The Hamilton County coroner wants a full police investigation into whether an 8-year-old boy’s suicide resulted from possible bullying at school and should be ruled a homicide.

Coroner Lakshmi Sammarco said her office will dig deeper into the case based on a surveillance video taken inside Carson School and a police detective’s analysis.

[...]

CPS released a statement Thursday with a different account of what happened. The district said there is no video evidence that other students were beating Taye. The district added that it’s not clear if there’s a connection between the school incident and Taye’s suicide.

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<snip> http://www.wcpo.com/news/education/...r-old-boys-death-after-carson-school-incident

CPS = Cincinnati Public Schools

Rest in peace you sweet little angel. This is so heartbreaking.

More about the incident:

Someone from the school called Gabe's mother to let her know her son had fainted and was being treated by the nurse, Branch told the Enquirer.

His mother later took Gabe to the hospital after he vomited twice, according to the Enquirer. Gabe told his mother his stomach hurt, and Branch told the paper that Reynolds believes her son did not know what had taken place at the school.

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<snip> http://www.nydailynews.com/news/nat...-unconscious-8-year-old-boy-article-1.3156472

The school didn't inform Gabe's mother about what actually happened at in the restroom at school. :steamed:


Gabriel Taye

http://www.cincinnati.com/story/new...-video-alleged-bullying-8-year-old/101554622/

On Friday, a small group of demonstrators gathered on the sidewalk outside Carson Elementary, with some parents complaining about their children being bullied.

[...]

Her 9-year-old daughter, Jericka, said she has been bullied as recently as this week, when another girl smacked her. She said she has seen a lot of bullying at the school and doesn't think it will get any better.

[...]

Another demonstrator outside the school said her 9-year-old daughter was jumped by other girls on a school bus and had marks and bruises on her face.


"She doesn't even want to go to school anymore, and she always liked school," Amy Henson said. "Her grades have been slipping since this started."

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<snip> http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/...y-suicide-school-bullying-20170512-story.html

Wow. Sounds like bullying was rampant at this school, although in the articles from yesterday it sounded like administrators and staff didn't know of any bullying. Sounded like it was isolated to one child with behavior issues. Glad parents are protesting and I hope the school is sued. There's no reason children should be afraid to go to school. When I was in elementary school, I dreaded going to school and was often sick to my stomach (due to nerves) but was never beaten up. Just can't imagine. If I had faced this amount of physical aggression, my mother would've had to drag me to school kicking and screaming every day.

RIP Gabriel. So sorry for what you went through. Hopefully, the lives of your schoolmates can be saved because of what has been brought to the light by your death.

Indy Anna said:

This is heartbreaking.

<snip> https://www.usatoday.com/story/news...eaten-kicked-kills-himself/317441001/?ref=yfp

Poor Gabriel. I'm astonished that the behavior of the boy who instigated the attack had not been previously addressed, IMO. No behavior program, psychological counseling? Yet all of the kids in the school appeared to be in fear of him.

When the Vice Principal realized what was happening, he rushed into the restroom to help Gabriel. I'm curious whether another child reported the incident to office staff, or if someone in the school office observed what was happening on surveillance. Why did it take so long? The first article says Gabe was assaulted for 5 min after he was knocked unconscious. The 2nd article (below) says he was unconscious 7½ min.

The Hamilton County coroner wants to reopen the investigation.

<snip> http://www.wcpo.com/news/education/...r-old-boys-death-after-carson-school-incident

CPS = Cincinnati Public Schools

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God love it's little heart. Still a baby. Bullying is NEVER ok.

Indy Anna said:

<snip> http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/...y-suicide-school-bullying-20170512-story.html

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I can't believe the headline to the article linked above:

School: 8-year-old Ohio boy who killed himself never said he was bullied

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Why is this the headline? Why not "Boy, 8, who killed himself didn't think any adults would listen to or help him"?

I mean, I know why. The adults want to blame the helpless child instead of accepting responsibility for their own negligence.

Indy Anna said:

<snip> http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/...y-suicide-school-bullying-20170512-story.html

Wow. Sounds like bullying was rampant at this school, although in the articles from yesterday it sounded like administrators and staff didn't know of any bullying. Sounded like it was isolated to one child with behavior issues. Glad parents are protesting and I hope the school is sued. There's no reason children should be afraid to go to school. When I was in elementary school, I dreaded going to school and was often sick to my stomach (due to nerves) but was never beaten up. Just can't imagine. If I had faced this amount of physical aggression, my mother would've had to drag me to school kicking and screaming every day.

RIP Gabriel. So sorry for what you went through. Hopefully, the lives of your schoolmates can be saved because of what has been brought to the light by your death.

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They knew trouble was there, but looked the other way. We have seen this before. This got shades of South Hadley, Penn State, BBC/National Health Service, Roman Catholic Church, and USA Gymnastics.

Do 8 yr olds know how to commit suicide by hanging? Surely this must be very rare.

musicaljoke said:

Do 8 yr olds know how to commit suicide by hanging? Surely this must be very rare.

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I mean this is my question. What 8 year old is like "I'm going to end my life because I am tired of being bullied by strangling myself with this rope"?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

This is horrifying. My daughter had a incident at the beginning of the school year with another boy in her grade. She was washing her hands and the little boy came up and bam, bam, bam, punched her in her side.

Three days later, Sunday night my daughter was hystericaly crying so hard she could barely talk but finally we got the story of the little boy. We asked her if the teacher knew and what she did and were told it was a substitute and she just told the little boy to knock it off.

She did have slight brushing on her side. My daughter then asked the heartbreaking question of why. Why did he hurt her? We had always told her hitting was bad but the boy didn't get in trouble. We asked her why she didn't say anything and she said the teacher knew and she didn't want to be a tattle tale.

As we marched through the school to talk to her teacher we noticed all the don't tattle signs. Long story short we were told they would talk to the boy and have the school counseler talk to both, by this point it was a week later. Come to find out sub never told anyone of the incident anyone and although the boy had hitting incidents before it was our daughters word against his.

Fast forward a month later, during a school assembly little boy that hit my daughter got a outstanding citizen award for model behaviour.

There's the bullying and how it's handled, they are both kindergarteners and so you have the question of what is bullying what is tattling? In my daughters mind teacher saw what happened and did nothing therefore somehow it was her fault for being upset over it.

Mylitta said:

This is horrifying. My daughter had a incident at the beginning of the school year with another boy in her grade. She was washing her hands and the little boy came up and bam, bam, bam, punched her in her side.

Three days later, Sunday night my daughter was hystericaly crying so hard she could barely talk but finally we got the story of the little boy. We asked her if the teacher knew and what she did and were told it was a substitute and she just told the little boy to knock it off.

She did have slight brushing on her side. My daughter then asked the heartbreaking question of why. Why did he hurt her? We had always told her hitting was bad but the boy didn't get in trouble. We asked her why she didn't say anything and she said the teacher knew and she didn't want to be a tattle tale.

As we marched through the school to talk to her teacher we noticed all the don't tattle signs. Long story short we were told they would talk to the boy and have the school counseler talk to both, by this point it was a week later. Come to find out sub never told anyone of the incident anyone and although the boy had hitting incidents before it was our daughters word against his.

Fast forward a month later, during a school assembly little boy that hit my daughter got a outstanding citizen award for model behaviour.

There's the bullying and how it's handled, they are both kindergarteners and so you have the question of what is bullying what is tattling? In my daughters mind teacher saw what happened and did nothing therefore somehow it was her fault for being upset over it.

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Everyone has a responsibility to stop bullying from parents to teachers.

HMSHood said:

Everyone has a responsibility to stop bullying from parents to teachers.

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Totally agree, and communication is key between schools and parents. I explained to my daughter that she can tattle to me all she wants to.

I think what scares me the most about this story is how many kids just walked by and didn't seem like they informed an adult.

Peppermintswirlz said:

I can't believe the headline to the article linked above:



Why is this the headline? Why not "Boy, 8, who killed himself didn't think any adults would listen to or help him"?

I mean, I know why. The adults want to blame the helpless child instead of accepting responsibility for their own negligence.

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Mylitta said:

Totally agree, and communication is key between schools and parents. I explained to my daughter that she can tattle to me all she wants to.

I think what scares me the most about this story is how many kids just walked by and didn't seem like they informed an adult.

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Speaking from experience, when children refrain from telling a teacher/parent about a problem with a peer, it's because they know it will only make the situation worse. The aggressor will become more aggressive and other children will harass the "tattle tale," too. IMO, other children sometimes take the side of the bully to avoid becoming targets themselves. I say this not so much from memory of what I experienced as a child, but from what I've experienced as an adult.

In a former job I had more than a decade, I was bullied because of a physical disability and my condition worsened as I was forced to do things I was instructed by doctors not to do. There was one coworker who was sometimes friendly with me when the bullies weren't around. I really didn't get a sense she intended any malice, but would jokingly threaten to knock me down. But, there were times she seemed scared of the bullies, so I surmised she wanted to appease them (by talking "tough") to avoid being the target herself. I had one coworker there who really was sympathetic and offered to help me, but then was transferred to another department because (according to my supervisor) people were complaining. When I tried talking to the supervisor about my limitations, he said he wasn't worried about it (But...but...but...I was!). I thought about talking to various other managers and executives in the company, but I noticed the ones who remained with the company and received promotions were the ones who kowtowed to the bullies. Years later, when I was in a different job, where one of the bosses from the former job was also working at the time, he showed me an article in the local newspaper about the woman who used to threaten to knock me down. She had won some kind of award for being kind/compassionate. I didn't say anything to my boss, but I remember thinking: "How is that supposed to make me feel, when the person who threatened me with violence is publicly recognized for her kindness?!" IMO, that must be what Mylitta's daughter is thinking about her bully.

Sorry. I don't want to take over the thread with anecdotes about myself, but I want to try to understand, and help others understand, what little Gabriel was going through. What I've experienced isn't nearly the aggression Gabriel experienced that one day, but I know it's terrifying for a child who is afraid to go to school while adults are telling the child, "You have to go to school!" And, sometimes when we are targeted, we tend to blame ourselves. Any way, that's the message we get from those close to the situation, so we begin to believe it ourselves and we can then start hating ourselves. I don't know if the day Gabriel was beaten unconscious was his first experience with the bully. He tried shaking the bully's hand in a gesture of peace. Is that what a teacher or school administrator told him to do as though he held the key to stop the bullying himself? It just infuriates me to think adults were trying to pass on or shun responsibility. :steamed:

Tssiemer said:

I mean this is my question. What 8 year old is like "I'm going to end my life because I am tired of being bullied by strangling myself with this rope"?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

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I've heard young people say "Just kill yourself" like it was a normal thing to say to someone. It is cruel. It is unforgivable. This boy was assaulted to the point to unconsciousness. Who knows what the bullies said to him?

Tssiemer said:

I mean this is my question. What 8 year old is like "I'm going to end my life because I am tired of being bullied by strangling myself with this rope"?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

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I'm wondering about this, too. How well does a child younger than 10 understand the permanence of death? They certainly cannot determine for themselves that employing a certain method (e.g., hanging) will end their lives. Do they think of it more as a temporary remedy to avoid an averse situation? But, to recognize, even vaguely, the biomechanics of hanging, a child would have to see it demonstrated (e.g., on TV). MOO

I found this article that discusses children's understanding of death:

This new research demonstrates that children first conceptualise death as a biological event around age 5 or 6 years, at the same time that they begin to construct a biological model of how the human body functions to maintain &#8216;&#8216;life&#8217;&#8217;.

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<snip> http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/...chase_site_license=LICENSE_DENIED_NO_CUSTOMER

musicaljoke said:

Do 8 yr olds know how to commit suicide by hanging? Surely this must be very rare.

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It seems that more children are committing suicide, and they are doing so at a younger age. MOO

A suicide at age 8? Very rare, but not inconceivable

The death was startling even to the coroner: a boy only 8 years old apparently killing himself in his Cincinnati bedroom.

Now Gabriel Taye's January death is being re-examined, after it emerged that he was bullied and knocked unconscious at school two days before he died.

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An assistant principal arrived about 4 ? minutes later to look at him. The school system said that it was "concerned about the length of time that (the boy) lay motionless and the lack of adult supervision at the scene" but that administrators followed protocol by having the nurse evaluate him. School officials said the boy told staff he had fainted and never said he had been bullied or assaulted.

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<snip> http://abcnews.go.com/Health/wireStory/suicide-age-rare-inconceivable-47401142

Still, I'm wondering how the vice principal became aware of Gabe laying unconscious in the restroom. Did he observe the child lying on floor on surveillance. There was a surveillance camera available to administrators, with footage of prior events recorded. Even if the v.p. knew to check on Gabe because another child informed him there was a child lying motionless on the rr floor, he had that tape available to him to see what caused Gabe to lose consciousness. IMO, there is no excuse for them not to do more.

Also, since Gabe went to school Jan 26, the day that he later hung himself (2 days after the assault), I have to wonder if he was again assaulted, or maybe he faced verbal taunts from schoolmates, which made it too much to bear.

Indy Anna said:

Speaking from experience, when children refrain from telling a teacher/parent about a problem with a peer, it's because they know it will only make the situation worse. The aggressor will become more aggressive and other children will harass the "tattle tale," too. IMO, other children sometimes take the side of the bully to avoid becoming targets themselves. I say this not so much from memory of what I experienced as a child, but from what I've experienced as an adult.

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Respectfully snipped by me.

I too have been in that boat before of if I complained to a higher up about being bullied, I was often the one to blame (as in blame the victim) yet I could be totally minding my own business at the time it happened. Worse yet should I try to defend myself, guess who got into trouble - yep, me, not the bully. Therefore as a child I did not bother to defend myself because I knew what was going to happen. At some point you give up and not bother talking about it to anyone.

Poor Gabriel - utterly sad, that poor little angel.