Mom put in hospital by daughter’s bullies

When Maria Jimenez went with her family last Tuesday to talk to the high school principal about the bullying of her 16-year-old daughter, she probably had concerns over just how seriously the issue would be taken.

Those concerns have now been dispelled, but that won’t be any comfort to Jimenez.

Before she even made it to James Logan High School in Union City, California, she, her partner and daughter were confronted outside by two teenage girls, one of whom was recognized for bullying the daughter.

“They started screaming at us, ‘What you wanna do? Who’s going to fight first,'” Jimenez’s partner, Eder Rojas, told ABC7.

The girls then began laying into Jimenez in what she described as a “very furious” attack. “They grabbed me by the hair and dragged me,” she told reporters via a translator.

“I just wanted to talk to the principal. You’d never imagine a kid would hit an adult. I thought we were safe on campus,” Jimenez added.

Rojas managed to pull one of the teens off his daughter, who also took a hit.

But Jimenez, who gave birth to a baby girl just four months ago, came off by far the worst, with injuries severe enough to warrant two days in hospital following the alleged attack.

Union City police responding to the incident arrested one of the teenagers, who faces charges for battery and serious bodily injury.

“We are investigating and following up on this incident working directly with the Union City Police Department, and taking disciplinary actions. We believe this incident to be between the two Logan students and [it] does not appear to involve any other Logan students,” the school said in an e-mail to parents.

A GoFundMe page set up to help Jimenez cover medical expenses had already raised more than $8,000 of its $10,000 goal by Monday morning.

Jimenez’s family are, quite understandably, searching for a new high school for their daughter. Although worrying statistics show around a third of high-schoolers experience bullying, let’s hope they can at least find one where the bullying stops at the school gate.