Florida boy, 15, who brutally attacked 9-year-old girl in bus will now face battery charges
If you or anyone you know suspects child abuse, you are urged to immediately call the Childhelp National Child Abuse Hotline at 1-800-4-A-Child or 1-800-422-4453, or go to www.childhelp.org.
HOMESTEAD, FLORIDA: The 15-year-old Florida teenager who was caught on camera brutally hitting a 9-year-old girl on a school bus has been charged with battery, authorities said on Tuesday, February 7. The third-grader, a student at Coconut Palm K-9 Academy in Homestead, is relentlessly attacked by the larger teen and another boy in the horrifying, widely circulated video as she frantically attempts to fend them off on a crowded bus on Wednesday, February 1.
A student can be seen repeatedly striking the young girl in the video after a group of children on a school bus are seen squabbling for one minute. In the nearly 30 seconds of the attack captured on film by a classmate, no one steps in to stop it.
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What did the girl's family say?
According to the arrest report, the 15-year-old revealed to detectives that he beat the girl multiple times in the head because she got into an argument with his brother. "Just conversating about it, she got a little emotional and didn’t want to speak anymore," said the girl's mother, who only wanted to be identified as Jenni. "She has self-blame and fear from the situation. It's just a lot of trauma to heal and it's a process for us here at home," as reported by NBC Miami.
The victim's mother informed Local 10 News that charges would be filed. “My goal is not to incriminate any other children,” the mother said Thursday, February 2. “My goal is to make sure they have the security for the kids to make sure this doesn’t continue to happen.”
The distraught mother claimed that school administrators urged her to enroll her three children in another school because of the violence occurring inside and outside of the school. During their brief time at the school, her two older children were also targets of bullying, she claimed, but counselors and officials did nothing to address her concerns.
In a statement, Miami-Dade County Public Schools said it would respect whatever measures the State Attorney's Office conducts against the teenagers involved in the incident.
“Miami-Dade County Public Schools will always work collaboratively with the Miami-Dade State Attorney’s Office to protect our student victims from violence and to seek justice under the law,” the statement read. “The District supports and respects the role of the Miami-Dade State Attorney’s Office in ultimately reviewing and determining the most appropriate charge for each respective case.”
What will happen now?
After an investigation, the school's police officer opted to issue the 15-year-old kid a civil ticket, which Miami-Dade State Attorney Katherine Fernandez Rundle determined was insufficient after additional study.
"February 1, 2023, school bus video of a 15-year-old boy pummeling a 9-year-old girl, clearly shows that this beating was far more serious than a simple student altercation. The school’s police officer who investigated the matter had the discretion to issue a civil citation, as the officer did here, or make an arrest for misdemeanor battery," Fernandez Rundle said in a statement. "We believe that, based on the evidence and the circumstances, the use of a civil citation was incompatible with the level of violence displayed by the 15-year-old against his much younger and smaller victim. As a result, we have filed criminal battery charges with our juvenile courts," as reported by New York Post.