Following three months of harassment by fellow students at South Hadley High School, student Phoebe Prince committed suicide. Prince’s reported “bullycide” has brought national scrutiny on the quiet suburban town of South Hadley and provoked a lawsuit against the students involved in the bullying. The prosecution announced on Monday that nine South Hadley students were being indicted on felony charges in the case of Prince’s death.
The charges against the students are part of an anti-bullying movement in the state that began following the suicide of Springfield student Carl Walker last year.
The students who bullied Phoebe Prince should be punished. No one is questioning this. But I have to wonder what the endgame is. Are Massachusetts officials really seeking justice for Phoebe, or are they trying to protect our state’s reputation?
A felony charge is a harsh punishment for behaviors that wouldn’t merit a detention in most school systems. The students at South Hadley High had no way of knowing that their actions would result in Phoebe’s death. Students are bullied in schools every day – and rarely are there any repercussions. Phoebe Prince’s suicide was a wake-up call about the reality of bullying in our school system, but the reaction to her death has been too much, too late. By turning bullying into a felony, Massachusetts officials will not eradicate it from public high schools, but instead, turn it into a hot-button issue and increase tensions within the school and the community.
If every girl who called another girl a derogatory word was brought before the Massachusetts courts, the Commonwealth’s District Attorneys wouldn’t have time to do anything else. You’ve all seen the movie Mean Girls. Who here has ever felt personally victimized by Regina George? The answer: everyone.
The story of Prince’s death has sex – not just the kind that makes babies, but also the sensationalist appeal that sells newspapers. It’s sensational, it’s tawdry; it will probably be a Lifetime movie next year. But the story has become more important than the case itself. The charges against the teenagers are building into a witch-hunt. The prosecution is trying to make an example of these students, to show that bullying won’t be tolerated in their school systems. But we have to ask ourselves: is this really the right way to address bullying in our schools? Will bringing criminal charges against the South Hadley ‘Mean Girls’ really change anything?
Nine teenagers have been brought up on charges ranging from statutory rape and criminal harassment to “violation of civil rights resulting in bodily injury.” Six are being tried as adults on felony charges. Another three are being tried in juvenile court. According to Northampton District Attorney Elizabeth Scheibel, one more student is being investigated and may be charged. No school officials are being tried. In an interview with the New York Times, Scheibel said this was because the administrators had “a lack of understanding of harassment associated with teen dating relationships.”
Scheibel also said in the interview that at least four students and two faculty members tried to intervene in the bullying or report it to the administrators. No further action was taken.
The indictment of the South Hadley students is a way for Massachusetts officials to show that they are doing something about the problem of bullying. Phoebe Prince’s “bullycide” was an embarrassment to the town of South Hadley. The prosecution is making an example of these students in order to protect the area’s reputation.
South Hadley town selectman Robert Judge told the New York Times “Like most towns, we like to think of ourselves as a good place to live, and then this happens and your reputation is sullied nationally and even internationally and people look at you differently and make assumptions.”
Trumping up charges against the teenagers now doesn’t make up for the lack of action on the part of the administration at the time the bullying took place. There were adults who knew what was going on at the time Phoebe was harassed – and they did nothing. Criminalizing the act of “bullying” isn’t going to improve the situation in South Hadley Schools because it does not address the real problem. Turning bullying into a felony only deals with the after-effects of bullying – it punishes students after the damage has been committed. The schools need to focus more on suicide prevention, and on creating a system for dealing with bullying before it reaches the point it did with Phoebe Prince.
Rachel Dougherty is a Collegian columnist. She can be reached at [email protected].
reseakc • Apr 12, 2010 at 7:44 pm
Bullying is not murder. Charge these kids with assault, battery, terrorist threats, violation of civil rights (the right to assemble, as in Ms. Prince’s right to attend school without feeling threatened), statutory rape, whatever. But they didn’t kill Phoebe Prince. She made that decision herself. Bullies are not automatically future sociopaths, and the bullied are not automatically suicidal. I know plenty of people who bullied me when we were young kids and if I happen to see them around town over summer we smile and wave and say hello. People are stupid and do stupid things. The claim that Phoebe was bullied severely over the course of a few months doesn’t change anything… murder is murder, and bullying is not. Even if their actions directly caused her suicide, there is no way anyone could have expected her to do so, as suicide is not a reasonable, rational action for any person to take (especially over being bullied) and they should not be held responsible. The administrators, on the other hand, are responsible for the bullying and physical/verbal crimes committed against Phoebe, but not her death. Seriously… everyone feels really bad, this is a tragedy, but the law is the law. Prince’s family and this community shouldn’t stretch the law to fit their desire for vengeance.
Garette • Apr 7, 2010 at 10:51 am
This is not a case of a few words resulting in death. This is a case where real and articulable crimes were committed. This girl was stalked, assaulted, harassed and raped (statutory still counts). Whether the school intervened or enabled is an issue that I hope will come up in the civil suit. These young adults were charged as anyone should be when their conduct breached the boundaries of our laws.
Until we as a society actually make a few examples and say enough we will continue to have children kill themselves and others as a result of the atrocious conduct of their classmates.
The author of this article has one no understanding of the laws that she is writing about and two no sympathy for the victem in this case. Maby she has a shot for a job with Fox News.
JS OBrien • Apr 2, 2010 at 10:47 am
Rachel, I know that you’re probably young, or you wouldn’t be writing for a college paper. Being young, you may not yet realize that certain verbal and/or physical abuse of others rises to the level of criminal behavior. For instance, one is not allowed to throw a can of Red Bull at someone from a moving vehicle. I have no idea if the can was full. If it was, it could have killed or seriously injured someone. In the end, it doesn’t matter. Throwing objects from moving vehicles at people is against the law, and for good reason.
Another thing you may not realize is that people are not allowed to go beyond a certain level of verbal abuse. Assault laws forbid this. People are not allowed to stalk other people, either. Nor are they allowed to restrain someone in a space by blocking a door, as has recently been reported, and may well lead to further charges.
So much that has been written about this case has been positioned as “being mean.” I suppose “mean” is such an all-encompassing term that Charles Manson could be accused of being mean, also, but it’s not very useful in his or in this context. Being mean and nasty is not criminal. Stalking, statutory rape, throwing objects at people from moving vehicles, and the like, most certainly are.
It’s best that you learn this before you enter the adult world, Rachel, and perhaps it’s even best to learn this now, because children are also required to follow the law. And that means you, too.
Samantha • Apr 2, 2010 at 9:21 am
Please read this editorial, it says what I’m trying to say maybe better than I can, though it should go on to ask why charges against officials are not possible. It would seem they are or ought to be possible, and the reason they’re not being pursued is in part a choice to not pursue what might be a more difficult case to prove and also might be part of a tacit deal for the most liable of school staff to avoid prosecution:
Educators could have stopped the torture
By Margery Eagan, Boston Herald
Tuesday, March 30, 2010
http://bostonherald.com/news/columnists/view.bg?articleid=1243309
Read the entire editorial. The last three paragraphs are especially telling:
So here was a young girl from Ireland, new to the school, new to America, new to a high school’s cliques and brutal pecking order. Here she was left on her own against not only the nine teenagers charged yesterday and their enabling friends but also against the adults who ignored her pleas.
The public may wonder, said Scheibel, whether the failure to act “by faculty, staff and administrators . . . amounted to criminal behavior. In our opinion it did not.”
In my opinion, that failure was so monstrous it’s almost incomprehensible. But we now know why Phoebe Prince did not believe her torment would end. She told her mother, who told the school. Yet on the day she died, she was attacked in the library right in front of a teacher. She was attacked again in the hallway and again as she walked home. Two hours later, her little sister found her wearing the very same clothes she wore to school.
Samantha • Apr 2, 2010 at 9:07 am
Look, these students aren’t just being prosecuted and singled out for blame just to get the town off the hook, they may also be targeted to help get the school off the hook, and with that reduce the chance that school officials might be charged as well, and that the parents of the kids may become more liable in a civil suit, and maybe the school less liable.
It’s hard to imagine that given how little the school intervened that they’re liable, maybe even some in criminal ways, of something like negligence, lack of due diligence, failure to exercise a duty to care, etc.
The students involved and indicted may well be guilty of some or all of what they are charged with, but given the extreme nature of the charges (and so many charges) it seems odd that the DA would file no charges — if that’s what’s happening — against anyone besides some students, and speak so respectfully of the school:
http://bostonherald.com/news/columnists/view.bg?articleid=1243566
(from the Boston Herald editorial)
“A lack of understanding of harassment associated with teen dating relationships seems to have been prevalent in South Hadley High School,” she said.
Basically, that’s a nice way of saying teachers who might have been able to intervene in the “aggressional behavior” that drove Pheobe Prince to her death were either ignorant as to what was happening under their noses, indifferent or both.
(end quote)
…
I’m interested in learning more about the school’s role in this and steps they may be taking to shift responsibility and liability away from the school, administrators, and teachers who may be involved — and who with potentially far deeper pockets than working-class parents are vulnerable to being sued.
I would like to see more reporting on the teachers and administrators involved in this case. The story goes that teachers and administrators, as this story in part goes into, were aware through multiple sources including directly witnessing incidents, that Phoebie was being severely harassed and did essentially nothing. How is it that such serious charges can be levied against minors and nothing at all against adults who were in a position of responsibility, who had a “duty to care”?
It is reasonable to ask if some sort of deal was made to help school staff avoid charges, maybe in exchange for testifying or providing other information which helped build a case against the students. If there are no charges brought against any staff or administration member, and the charges against the students remain as serious as they are, I have to wonder if part of the reason for that may be because of an agreement of testimony from teachers and administrators in exchange for avoiding prosecution, testimony which helped make the charges as serious, even to the point of being extreme, as they appear to be..
Of course the students who committed these offenses should be punished. I don’t know how much punishment they should get, but more than just being suspended or expelled, if the charges are true. But if they are potentially facing all of these charges and the school staff was as aware and engaged in contact with students and Phoebe’s parents as the story is reporting, it would seem they clearly failed to act to protect her, and ought to be vulnerable to charges themselves.
If they aren’t, there’s certainly a story there to look into.
Ben • Apr 2, 2010 at 8:24 am
Rachel makes some valid points. While it’s true that Phoebe didn’t kill herslf because of one or two vitriolic comments, it is true that one or two vitriolic comments will be a felony in future scenarios. Also, who’s to decide what’s vitriolic? It’s been my experience that there’s a double standard in society about who may say what and when.
I also worry that this anti-bullying legislation will chill free speech in high schools. I frequently say things that other people find insensitive and they frequently tell me to shut up. The reason I don’t sut up is because I don’t really care if it’s insensitive; I care if it’s true. I can imagine this poor girl’s death as a weapon against my speech. For example, could a student still say that homosexuality is sinful? Can a student be disciplined for mentioning that nearly all terrorists are Muslims? Can a student be punished fof saying that women in the military has been an unmitigated failure? If not, then we’ve crossed a line. Free speech is dead.
Some people will seize on exactly this type of incident to do what they’ve alwasy wanted to do–outlaw dissenting opinions. If you think that a person should be prevented from saying any of the aforementioned statements, you’re probably one of those people.
Kate L • Apr 2, 2010 at 2:53 am
Today’s bullies are tomorrow’s sociopaths. Do you really think waiting until they’ve beaten a child, attacked their spouse, tortured an animal, or abused an elderly or disabled person is a better policy? Whether charges “change anything” is immaterial. The family – and the victim in particular – deserve justice.
ame • Apr 2, 2010 at 2:02 am
The issue has been building in the past 5 years. What we are seeing is the tipping point.
The matter is bigger than the people involved and it’s a reflection of the changes that our society wants to make.
There will be some growing pains as we find the right balance from prevention to accountability, but bringing national attention to the issue of bullying is the first big step in forcing our society to seriously consider the different points in the issue and to make a stand.
anonymous • Apr 2, 2010 at 12:39 am
Mercy was me not taking a 12 gauge shotgun into my middle school.
After a broken arm, a dozen concussions and other assorted *physical* things (not foul mouthed words), mercy was me not taking a gun in and simply killing my turmentors. And the teachers & admin folk who enabled them…
I think we can all agree that a criminal prosecution is preferable….
max • Apr 2, 2010 at 12:06 am
An example has to be made out of these kids! If we don’t do it now when will it stop. It’s about time that somebody in a position of authority says enough is enough. You might argue that this type of bullying was done many times before for many years in many different schools. But that doesn’t make it right. It seems like the only way to make a difference and put an end to this is to take a strong stance now. It may seem harsh to these 9 accused, but what about for Pheobe? I don’t know what will happen in their future, but at least they will still have one. That is more than I can say for Pheobe!
Shelley • Apr 1, 2010 at 11:31 pm
This is a ridiculous article. Phoebe Prince was not just called a few names. She was publicly abused, verbally and physically, by a remorseless dehumanizing mob for months on end. The abuse was incessant, disruptive, and vicious, and took place in front of authority figures and peers. If Phoebe had been treated this badly by employers, she could have sued them for constructive termination and slander. If she had been treated this way by a landlord, she could have sued for constructive eviction and slander. If she had been treated this way, as an adult, by a boyfriend or neighbors, she could have sued them for stalking, harassment, and slander. Why, because she was a child, was she not entitled to legal protection? On the contrary, I believe she should have been protected more carefully than an adult – not denied rights because she was underage.
richard • Apr 1, 2010 at 11:22 pm
Even children know what is wrong and what is right.
The kind of behaviour which led to the young woman’s death needs to be punished in the same way as causing death while DUI. How else do we stop this?