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| This article, as well as several follow up pieces that were written as the court case unfolded, was about a very sad case where 13-year-old black boy was paddled on the thighs and buttocks by a white principal. A few days later his mother came with him to the school to complain about the extent of the paddling. Like so many of the other mom’s we’ve seen in chapter one, she did not object to paddling beforehand, but was nonetheless upset over the severity of her son’s paddling after the fact, when it was too late. | | The “conference” degenerated at some point. By various accounts the principal ordered the mother and son to leave the school, she cursed at him, he called the police, she attempted to leave with her son, and the principal may have then physically tried to prevent them from leaving until the police arrived. At some point a scuffle broke out. The boy stabbed the principal with a nail file several times that he had hidden in his book bag. Most of the wounds were shallow and superficial, but one hit his heart and killed him. | | The 13-year-old boy was charged as an adult with first degree murder and convicted. The mother of the teen said the principal pushed her son to the floor just before the stabbing. There was some kind of struggle. Investigators said they believed the principal was stabbed four times with a metal nail file in the neck, shoulder, hand, and chest, and that three of the wounds “weren’t that deep.” The one that was most serious went between the ribs, never hitting bone, and hitting the heart. | | The mother said she thought her son was “reacting out of fear.” | | "I believe he was afraid of Mr. Kennedy," the mother said. "He just lost control, I think, but it happened so quick." | | Of special interest to us here, regardless of whatever thoughts we may have on the many side issues in this case, is that this child was paddled severely enough for his otherwise paddle-approving mother to make an angry trip to the school—and the principal lost his life in some kind of scuffle that ultimately ensued. | | The boy had been involved in a fight on Monday and had been paddled by the principal. Before the paddling the principal pulled the boy off a school bus and ripped his jacket, according to his mother. The principal paddled the boy on the top of his thighs and on his buttocks. The boy did not attend school the following day, and on Wednesday his mother went with him to complain about the extent of the paddling. It is interesting to read this mother repeat the tired refrain we so often hear from parents who are belatedly angry: "I said there's a way to whip a child, but not that way." |
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