A school fight caught on camera has the parents of a 16-year-old girl crying foul.
Santa Rosa High School suspended the teenager for fighting on campus, but her parents say she was being attacked by bullies from another school and was trying to defend herself.
The fight was captured on cell phone video shot by a student May 16 at Santa Rosa High. The mother of the girl seen in the clip being hit by two other girls claims her daughter was jumped. She said the two girls who jumped her were from another school and had been cyber-bullying her for months.
“I see my baby being attacked viciously and I see her defending herself like we taught her to,” the girl’s mother Mia Danley said.
Allen Danley said his daughter didn’t start the fight.
“She was heard screaming by several students there that ‘I don’t want to fight,’” he said.
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But now the 10th grader is being suspended for fighting. Her parents are livid.
“I’m trying very hard not to overreact, given the circumstances,” Allen Danley said.
Danley said he explained to the district that his daughter was being harassed by the two girls because she was dating one of their former boyfriends. He said he showed the school the cellphone texts that one his daughter’s alleged assailants sent threatening a fight.
“They said they were going to beat her up,” he said.
The parents understand Santa Rosa High has a “no fighting policy,” but Allen Danley pointed to student handbook, page 16, where “it clearly states that a student cannot be arrested or suspended for defending themselves.”
But Allen Danley said the school wouldn’t budge, saying his daughter didn’t cry out for help during the fight, so she is considered a participant.
When contacted Thursday, neither the school’s principal nor the district office agreed to comment.
