MA’S AGONY
Says ‘everybody got along’ with stab victim
ON THE last morning of his life, Matthew McCree woke up his mother to ask about making her favorite breakfast: pancakes, four pieces of bacon, scrambled eggs.
Hours later, a horrified Louna Dennis watched helplessly as the dying 15-year-old rolled past her on a stretcher outside his Bronx high school.
“I lost it,” the 34-year-old Dennis told the Daily News. “The police were holding me back. I was screaming, ‘My son! My son!’ I dropped to the ground.”
A weepy Dennis spoke out for the first time Friday, two days after her son was fatally stabbed by a fellow student in the middle of a history class at the Urban Assembly School for Wildlife Conservation.
“My son was no bully,” said Dennis, refuting stories that Matthew was stabbed for tormenting 18-year-old bisexual Abel Cedeno. “He was a wonderful child and everybody got along with him.
“The bullying story surprised me. I’d like to know where that came from. My son had no problems at school.”
According to police, McCree and his best pal Ariane Laboy, 16, had no history of harassing accused murderer Cedeno.
“Matthew was no bully,” a fellow student insisted Friday. “I’m bisexual and he never made fun or teased me. Matthew was good and kind.”
But cops also said the two stabbed teens instigated the fight by tossing wads of paper and pieces of broken pencils at Cedeno during the Wednesday morning
class. Laboy was in critical but stable condition after surviving the switchblade attack in a fifthfloor classroom. Cedeno smuggled the blade into a school that has no metal detectors. A backyard memorial to Matthew continued to grow Friday, one day after about 90 local kids appeared to pay their respects. Visitors left handwritten notes, balloons and photos of McCree.
Dennis started crying as she spoke about the kids in their Bronx building appearing in tears over the fatal stabbing.
Matthew’s stepbrother Kyle Victor “had to get taken out of school because he won’t stop crying,” said Dennis.
The family intends to hold a funeral for the slain teenager before considering any legal action in the slaying.
“There are serious legal issues involving the Department of Education and the NYPD school safety division that must be addressed here,” said family attorney Sanford Rubenstein.
Dennis said she sent Matthew to the Bronx high school because it was a smaller school and she considered it a safer option.