By Yun Suh-young
The police’s unprecedented booking of a teacher for neglecting his duty to prevent the suicide of one of his pupils is the latest hot-button issue at schools.
Yangcheon Police Station booked the homeroom teacher of the student who committed suicide last November, Monday, holding him accountable for failing to prevent school violence, the cause of the student’s death.
It is the first time a teacher has been booked for turning a blind eye to school violence.
The case is drawing keen public attention as the incident comes as the government is staging an all-out war against school violence and bullying.
A 14 year-old student identified as Kim, who was attending a middle school in Yangcheon district, jumped from the 15th floor of an apartment last year after swallowing 20 sleeping pills. The student had been suffering from violence from eight of her peers who hit, insulted, and harassed her over 15 times during a six-month period.
In her suicide note, she wrote, “There is nobody on my side. If I die, everything will be solved.” Names of the students who assaulted her were also written in the note.
Since last April, Kim’s parents had been calling the homeroom teacher asking for help when they became aware of their daughter’s situation. The parents visited the teacher over five times from April until November but their request for appropriate measures to protect their daughter were ignored, according to the police.
Kim’s homeroom teacher, identified as Ahn, said during police questioning that he “could not take appropriate measures regarding the issue because in order to report it to the school’s task force he needed testimony from the victimized student but Kim refused to do it out of fear of retaliation.”
When the fact that Kim’s parents visited the school became known, the violence against her was exacerbated, police said. She was bullied even more by her peers who said “Kim was a baby who told on her parents whenever something happened in school.”
Kim Dong-seok, spokesman for The Korean Federation of Teachers’ Associations said, “We need to verify the facts first. Since this is the first time for a teacher to be booked over a student’s suicide, it could have a ripple effect. We’re also trying to find out the truth behind the story.”
He added, “We cannot say, however, that the teacher did not have a moral responsibility to prevent the incident. There was. But regarding the factual and legal responsibilities, more needs to be found out.”
Some students and parents are criticizing the school for not only failing to prevent the violence but in its attitude dealing with the aftermath of the incident.
Some of the students from the school posted messages online following the incident. One message reads: “The school is trying to hide the incident by banning students from bringing chrysanthemums to school in commemoration of her death.” Another student wrote: “Teachers are keeping quiet on the issue.”
Meanwhile, there are concerns that the police are going over the top as they have been under growing pressure to prevent school violence.
Officers had apparently visited the school and openly sought out the perpetrators. It was later known that one of the investigated students tried committing suicide out of stress that she felt like she was a murderer.
Police also requested an arrest warrant last month for three of the eight students who committed the violence, but the central district court rejected it saying there wasn’t enough evidence.