15-year-old boy stabbed at school by fellow pupil

A teeNAGe boy was stabbed at school by another pupil yesterday morning amid an epidemic of knife-related violence among young people.

the boy of 15 was knifed in the shoulder at Beckfoot thornton School in Bradford, West Yorkshire, before being taken to hospital. Police arrested a male pupil of a similar age to the victim and seized a knife.

the victim’s injuries are not thought to be life-threatening.

Panicked parents rushed to collect their children from the school after learning of the stabbing from a local news website.

One mother, Karen Lupton, took to facebook to criticise the school’s ‘lack of communication’ for spreading panic, adding: ‘Parents [were] rushing to collect children while police were trying to investigate.’

headteacher Jeremy richardson confirmed in an email to parents that there had been incident at the secondary school, adding: ‘the safety of our students is our highest priority and we know our school community will need to understand how this could have happened.’

Worried parents have called for scanners to be installed at the school’s gates. One said: ‘I think they need to put some very strict measures in place, I think every child should be scanned so we know what children are going in there with.

‘We haven’t had any reassurance apart from the lady at the gate who said the children are OK, but other than that, nothing, which is appalling.’ A mother of a teenage boy who attends the school added: ‘I don’t even know how to react because I never expected something like this to happen especially here. You see knife crimes being reported on from America or London but for it to happen here has left me in shock.

‘I don’t understand what’s happened here today, it’s a good school.’ residents believe the attack was a ‘one off’.

Keith Grice, 76, who has lived nearby for 20 years, said: ‘this is an unusual thing to happen around here, the children never cause any issues.’