Middle school student jumps to death after  being bullied to join gang


A middle school student was found dead after being bullied in Yeongju, North Gyeongsang Province on Monday.

The death, an apparent suicide, comes just two months after the government unveiled a package of preventive measures when a string of school violence suicides shocked the nation.

It also undermined President Lee Myung-bak’s visit to Yeoju Middle School in Gyeonggi Province on the same day to praise the school as an example of efforts to prevent school violence.

The Education Ministry held an emergency meeting Tuesday and sent an official to investigate the incident.

Ministry officials said the authorities would maintain a 24-hour watch team at the North Gyeongsang education office to address the aftereffects of the death and provide counseling for students.

The student, a 14-year-old second-year boy at Yeongju Middle School, was found dead at around 9:30 a.m. on Monday at the front gate of the apartment block where he lived.

He left a handwritten suicide note detailing how he had been bullied by two classmates. They harassed him, demanding he join their gang and Lee felt frustrated when he could not find a way out.

“The reason I am going to kill myself is because of school violence. He harassed me (sexually) and spat on me,” he wrote on the note, local reports said. “He forced me to join a group of gangs. I didn’t want to but he said he would give me protection.”

Police discovered that Lee left home saying he was going to school on Monday morning, but did not show up, and sent a text message to a friend that he would be late. Investigators said he is believed to have jumped from the top of the apartment at about 7:57 a.m., when his teacher was calling him.

Police also said the boy had been receiving special counseling as he was considered a high suicide risk. Lee visited a hospital three times between June and December last year, and received counseling at school on eight occasions.

However, Lee did not tell his parents or teachers about the bullying.

The police plan to conduct an autopsy and have formed a task force headed by the Yeongju police chief, which questioned the two classmates named in his suicide note. They admitted they bullied Lee, but the two faced no criminal penalties because they are under 14 years old.

If the teachers are found to have failed to take measures to prevent the suicide, the police agency is considering booking them on charges of neglect of duty.

According to interim findings from the survey on school violence by the ministry last month, over 12 percent of school children have experienced abuse by classmates during the past year. Verbal assault and group bullying were the most frequent types.

By Lee Woo-young  (wylee@heraldcorp.com)