Ohio teacher with severe banana allergy almost died after students, who knew of her condition, smeared the fruit on her door

Although a group of middle school students in Ohio knew that their art teacher had a deadly allergy to bananas, they still played a prank on her involving the fruit, resulting in the educator getting hospitalized. 

The prank, played by a gang of Starling K-8 students - all aged between 12 and 13 years - during lunchtime in November 2018, involved them smearing banana peels on the unidentified teacher's classroom door and doorknob and later proceeding to throw the fruit at her when she entered the room.

The actions of the seventh graders were not due to a lack of awareness about their art teacher's medical condition. While one sign stating "Banana Free Zone" was posted on her classroom door, another similar sign instructed students to wash their hands if they had eaten a banana that day.

The incident was uncovered by ABC 6's Scoring Our Schools team as they probed into the fight for better working conditions for Columbus City School teachers including educator complaints about safety at schools. 

"All of the kids know she's deathly allergic to bananas," a Columbus City Schools (CCS) security officer told the police. "If it touches her, she will go into anaphylactic shock."

And that was exactly what happened after the teacher touched the banana-smeared door. She went into anaphylactic shock within 15 minutes of the students' prank and had to be administered two EpiPens before being rushed to the nearby hospital.

"She starts to change colors," said the security staffer. "They gave her one EpiPen; It wasn't working. They gave her another EpiPen (and) her throat was starting to close up."

She did manage to recover from her allergic reaction. 

According to police reports obtained by ABC6, the three students responsible or carrying out the assault were sentenced to probation through juvenile court. Details of the charges against them were not made public. It was also unclear if they faced any kind of punishment at the school. 

"That could be attempted murder. They're definitely going down for expulsion," the CCS security staffer was heard saying to a police officer on the bodycam video seen by the local news source. 

According to the Columbus Police Department, felony assaults on teachers were on the rise. From January 2019, more than 30 such cases have been documented. In 2017, officers responded to 65 felony assaults on school campuses in, which was nearly three times the number of assaults from 2016.