Bullying is a common problem that many children face in school. In addition to emotional abuse, some victims also suffer physical assault from their bullies.
A boy by the name of Harrison Fernandez, 12 years old, from the United Kingdom was recently a victim of bullying. Once he joined Colchester Academy in September 2019, five other boys began to target him. Many times he would go home with bruises and cuts all over his face and body from being beaten up.
For the last three months of school, he came home beaten and battered on a regular basis. The five boys would hit him, destroy his clothes, and leave him crying hysterically. They would torment him mercilessly; punching and kicking him while they called him terrible names.
The difficult part is that Harrison has autism.
Leanne, Harrison’s mother, called the police on these boys four times. The first time was only a few days after her son had started school when she saw he had been physically hurt by bullies. The second call came a week later after he’d been beaten by another bully.
On September 26, after Harrison was punched while getting picked up from school, she called the police again. In November 2019, her son told her that he was ‘scared’ and that the bullies had hurt him–this was her last call.
In her interview with Daily Mail, Leanne spoke about a bully who had threatened Harrison. She stated, “One child threatened him when he saw him and said, ‘we are looking for you’ and said, ‘we are going to stamp on your skull. ’ That’s not a normal thing for a 12-year-old to say. Obviously it all started off verbally with them saying he was gay, he walked gay, he looked gay, he talked gay. But on the second day, it escalated to physical. ”
She continued, “They tried “peanut-ing” the tie and it came off and they started pushing him and it continued out of school. He has had orange juice poured down the back of his neck, food taken away from him had three of them pushing him at one time… He had to go classes five minutes earlier than the others so that he could get there before them or they would punch him in the groin. He would come home and cry and say it’s too much to handle. ”
The concerned mom also explained that the boys would wait between classes just so they could ‘attack’ Harrison. She stated, “It is really upsetting for him. He had just started school and he is asking, ‘why have they got a problem with me?’ When you go into school every single day and a number of them are going up to him between classes punching him in the groin. It’s awful.”
Leanne explained that the school didn’t give the appropriate punishment to the bullies, and instead used temporary Band-Aid solutions. They would allow Harrison to leave early or come in late, so he wouldn’t cross paths with his bullies. The mom explained that all Harrison wanted was to go to school.
His doctor says that it would be harmful for him to attend school given how much pain and stress he has already been in.
When asked, the school stated that they could not comment on Harrison’s case due to confidentiality. However, they have released a statement previously saying that allegations of bullying are taken very seriously and their top priority is the safety of their students.
