Gaffney Student’s Injuries Called “Unintentional Assault”
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Gaffney Teen Assault
Gaffney Teen AssaultA Gaffney teenager—seriously injured in school. School officials, and Gaffney Police both say it was “horseplay” gone bad.
But Monday, police also said—it was an assault.
Officers say the student who caused the injury never meant to harm the teen. In fact, they are described as friends.
But what happened last Thursday at Gaffney High School left Javier Avila unconscious, and his face broken.
Now the other teen, a 15 year old, could face criminal charges.
The 9th grade Avila showed us his injuries friday, after he says another student grabbed him around the neck for some time—he blacked out—and when he woke up—he says he was in an ambulance—his face mangled.
Cherokee County School District Superintendent Bill James told NewsChannel 7 today—the school promptly reported the incident to police.
And video of the incident shows what they call horseplay, and that only one student caused Avila to go down and hit his face on the concrete floor.
However, police told us Monday, other students, were horseplaying with Avila before the choke hold.
And according to the police report—his head was shoved into a locker door as well.
However, the police chief says Avila’s injuries appear to be only from when he collapsed after the choke hold.
Chief Rick Turner with the Gaffney Police Department told us, “We have turned our investigation over to the Department of Juvenile Justice—they will be taking it to the Solicitor’s office for possible charges.“
He continued, “It outright constitutes an assault, when someone is rendered unconscious with that type of injury.“
The school district says that video of the incident has been offered to Avila’s family to watch to ease their concerns about motive.
Police tell us the school resource officer who would have been patrolling that hallway at the time was in another disciplinary meeting when the incident happened.
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Reader Reactions
I am a grandparent of a student of Gaffney High School and I am appalled at the attitude of the person speaking on behalf of the school. Who in their right mind would call this horseplay. When an attack of this nature is labeled horseplay, what kind of message does this give the students. I feel totally ashamed that we are showing not only the students but the community that we consider these actions horseplay at our school and do not hold our students to a higher standard of behavior. I hope that I see the appropriate action taken in the case to protect other students and their families from having to go through something like this in the future.
I have a son that goes to school at Gaffney High School he is friends with both the boys and he says that Javier is a good boy too and that he says this is not horseplaying either He is the same age as these two boys like I say he is friends with them so if he Knows it is not horseplaying then You have to believe it is not I think 5 days is Nothing to what Javier is going through He has a long road ahead of him too and We are suppose to be able to send out kids to school with out having to worry about someone choking them out That is ashame and I just hope they give the kids that done this more than just 5 days Get Well Soon JAVIER You are missed by your TRUE Friends!! YOU ARE IN ALL OF OUR PRAYERS.
“Gaffney Student’s Injuries Called “Unintentional Assault”—this is unbelievable….if they had been intentional the child would be dead.
This is just not a way to treat a friend….the article does say the boy who did this was his friend. Glad I do not have frieinds who would show their friendship that way.
This is so sad and the school should be ashamed. First off they have put too young of children with these older students and that needs to be changed and everything go back to the way it was…. I myself have small children but i can tell you if this every happens to one of my kids the school WOULD be SUID and there is no doubt about that.There are too many bullies in schools and that could be fixed if there were real adults working at the schools who could do hall monitoring. There is just no excuse why this happened. His face was broken therefore telling me that this went on for awhile but the boy blacked out so were was the school faculty when all this was going on.. I am a Gaffney graduate myself and even i know when it comes to stuff like this there is no one to be found until it is too late. I would be suing the school!!!!
I POSTED COMMENTS, AND ACCENDENTALLY HIT, TO CANCEL OTHER RESPONSES .PLEASE HAVE THEM E-MAILED TO ME. I WANT TO KEEP UP WITH THIS. THIS COULD BE ANYONES CHILD, AND I WOULD LIKE TO HERE THIS INFO.
Panthers34 ought to be ashamed of himself. What if this were your child?In this situation it does not matter what nationality he was…he was beaten and if he were my child I would be suing if the school doesn’t do anything. Ball brain.
Posted by ( Mrarff ) on September 28, 2009 at 3:25 pm
“AND his civil rights were violated. Yes his CIVIL RIGHTS. The child has the RIGHT to go to public school, and to expect to do so without being beaten”
Are you Je$$e Jackson or Al Sharptounge?
Well, if neither the School dist or the Sherrif’s dept won’t do anything, I’ve got a suggestion for the parents. Get you a real good lawyer. Put the school district,the kid and his parents, AND the STATE on the pointy end of a lawsuit. This is assault and battery with intent to kill,bodily injury of great magnitude, AND his civil rights were violated. Yes his CIVIL RIGHTS. The child has the RIGHT to go to public school, and to expect to do so without being beaten. Think about it….
This video shows too much injury for it to be just horseplay. There are gangs in the schools and the kids who get hurt are afraid to tell. Wake up parents!!
If you dont know what you are talking about please dont comment this is really serious and we are trying to find what really happened. And what happened to him does not look like horesplay!!!!This is his sister…
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