'IT HAPPENED TO ME, TOO' - BULLY VIC
A former student at the New Jersey high school where Adriana Kuch was bullied before taking her own life is sharing her own similar “humiliating” experience there.
“I went through physical assault in the same school when I was a freshman, and the humiliation, the bullying,” Olivia O’Dea told CBS-2 this week of her time at Central Regional HS in Berkeley Township.
O’Dea, whose family has sued the district over her experience, told the TV channel she was attacked by two students at the school in January 2022 and that a video of the incident was shared online.
Her experience is eerily similar to that of Kuch, 14, who died by suicide Feb. 3, two days after she was beaten in a school hallway and footage of the confrontation circulated on the Internet.
Kuch’s death sparked widespread outcry about the district’s alleged failure to address the school’s rampant bullying issue.
Repeated criticism from both Kuch’s family and student protests last week prompted schooldistrict Superintendent Triantafillos Parlapanides to abruptly resign over the weekend.
After initially avoiding punishment, the four girls allegedly involved in the attack against Kuch were also charged last week with various offenses, including aggravated assault.
“It’s a travesty that [the bullying is] continuing,” O’Dea’s mother, Rachael O’Dea, told NJ Advance Media of Kuch’s death.
Rachael O’Dea claims the school did not call authorities when her daughter was assaulted.
She subsequently removed her from the school and filed a lawsuit against the Central Regional School District in October.
‘No accountability’
“There’s no accountability [from the school], there’s no changes being made. This isn’t something new to them,” she lamented.
The family’s suit alleges that Olivia O’Dea was threatened by another student by text before she was attacked in the hallway, according to NJ Advance Media.
She reportedly shared the troubling messages with a teacher, a guidance counselor and administrators, but no actions were taken.
“This goes on in other districts. But in this particular school, there’s a real pattern of events like this, and this should never have happened with this young girl,” the O’Deas’ lawyer, Jonathan Ettman, told the outlet.
While Berkeley Township officials have reportedly vowed to reinforce the high school’s zerotolerance bullying policy, Kuch’s father, Michael, has said he will not be satisfied until the entire district in revamped.
“I want that entire administration gone,” he told The Post on Saturday.