The parents of a teen girl claim a Bronx Catholic school failed to act while their daughter was bullied so severely over a period of years that she swallowed 120 prescription pills in an effort to take her life, a lawsuit filed Tuesday alleges.
Rafael Hernandez, the dad of the now 15-year-old girl identified in the suit as T.H., claims he and his wife pleaded repeatedly with the staff at St. Margaret’s of Cortona in Riverdale to address bullying that extended from elementary school into junior high.
But in their lawsuit, they allege the school expressed concern but did not act to address the problem by either stopping it, suspending her alleged tormenters or otherwise disciplining them.
“We went to the administrators and faculty multiple times, there were a series of incidents,” said Hernandez, 48, a nurse at Columbia-Presbyterian Hospital. “It wasn’t a safe space for her to learn.”
The girl first became a target, Hernandez says, after she had to repeat kindergarten at the school’s suggestion. “The other kids noticed she had been left behind and she felt ashamed,” he said.
At one point in elementary school, some of the other kids tied a jump rope around the girl’s legs, causing her to fall in a way that her glasses cut into her face. She had to get treated for the cut at the emergency room.
When another school — St. John’s Visitation Church School — was closed because of diocese finances, the fourth and eighth grades were merged into St. Margaret’s.
School Principal Hugh Keenan lectured the existing parents to be “welcoming and sensitive” to the new kids. But the new kids also isolated and teased T.H., the lawsuit alleges.
“It actually made it worse — the bullying became more intense,” Hernandez said.
T.H. was repeatedly called derogatory names by students. She was repeatedly called “stupid,” “dumb,” and “retarded,” the lawsuit claims.
In fifth grade, she became more isolated. In April 2019, other girls at the school pretended on text to be a boy T.H. was sweet on other students and then rejected her, the lawsuit alleges.
A teacher’s solution was merely to have the girls apologize. But they were not disciplined, the lawsuit claims.
During the pandemic, the girl’s grades improved because she was in class on Zoom and not in school to be teased. But when that ended, the school declined to allow her to continue to take classes on Zoom and the teasing started again.
Her mom wrote a note to Keenan about the situation. “She has stopped participating in class in fear of being mocked,” the worried mom wrote. “We have provided her with all the emotional as well as professional help possible. However particular cruel words that hurt so deeply should, should not be tolerated. I ask that you handle this in a sensitive manner. “
Keenan took no action, Hernandez said. “He actually made it worse because he told my daughter to tell him what she wanted him to do,” he said. “She then felt so afraid to speak up.”
The ordeal came to a head at the end of 2021, when T.H. slept over at a friend’s house. The friend gave her the silent treatment then took T.H.’s phone and started sending “flirty” messages to two boys. T.H. was embarrassed, the lawsuit claims.
T.H. told her parents and then on Jan. 7, 2022 she got more than a dozen angry messages from the “friend,” accusing her of being a liar and a “s—-talker,” the lawsuit claims.
T.H., the lawsuit claims, then swallowed about eighty pills from a bottle containing her dad’s blood pressure medication plus 20 anti-depressant pills and 20 Motrin tablets.
She began vomiting repeatedly and the parents – the girl’s mom is also a nurse – rushed her to the hospital. “We took her to the car and sped down the highway to Columbia Presbyterian,” Hernandez said. “It was probably the most vulnerable I’ve been in my entire life. I wouldn’t wish it on anyone.”
T.H. spent three days in the hospital and when she felt better, the parents began thinking about a lawsuit. “I was so angry at what had happened,” Hernandez said “Last night, I told my daughter ‘You are the hero in this story. You can prevent this from happening to another girl.’ She feels she is helping and that’s everything right there.”
Mark Shirian, who is representing the family with Sanford Rubenstein, said whether the bullying happened inside or outside school is not relevant. The school’s actions are.
“It’s quite clear that the parents did everything they possibly could to make sure she was in a safe learning environment,” said the family’s lawyer Mark Shirian, who is handling the case with Sanford Rubenstein.
“The question is: what did the school do, especially after the principal learned of the situation.”
Now in 9th grade in a public high school in Westchester County, T.H.’s grades have improved and she has a nice circle of friends, her dad said.
“She’s 100% happier and is adapting very well,” Hernandez said. “The difference is the competent leadership in her current school.”