Posted on 07/17/2003 11:08:02 AM PDT by freepatriot32
Invercargill's James Hargest High School board of trustees yesterday stood by its decision to allow four boys to remain at school for indecent assault, while kicking out another student for smoking cannabis.
Chairman Murray Frost broke his three-day silence after the board reversed an earlier decision not to talk to media.
The high school has been publicly criticised this week, for the apparent disparity in punishments it meted out to students involved in two separate incidents.
The first, in May, involved an indecent assault on a 13-year-old third form girl during school time.
Her mother said the girl was tackled and pinned to the ground by two boys. Another boy held up her skirt while a fourth boy indecently assaulted her.
The boys stopped the assault only when other students intervened.
James Hargest stopped short of referring the boys to a disciplinary hearing before the board, opting instead to stand down the boys for four days.
The matter was referred to police who warned the boys and made them write letters of apology to the girl.
A month later, Scott Irvine, 14, was suspended then expelled after he admitted smoking cannabis while he stood with a group of other students. At the time he was out of school uniform, away from the grounds and out of school time.
Mr Frost said the board considered Scott had set a "harmful example" by introducing other students to a drug they had not experienced before.
But the mother of the girl who was assaulted said her daughter's incident was more than harmful.
"It was a nasty, nasty experience" which her daughter had been physically forced to participate in.
While it was likely teenagers would be introduced to cannabis in other settings outside the school, it was unlikely girls would be subject to such a horrific first-time sexual experience, she said.
The school's playground policies had forced the mother to consider taking the girl out of James Hargest.
There were claims by some parents of drug use and dealing at James Hargest, including claims of students being "high" during class.
Mr Frost admitted the board and staff probably did not know as much about cannabis as many of the students and the school had not involved police in any drug-related incidents.
He was across the street from the school and was seen by a teacher, the idiot.
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