16-year-old girl dies after being ‘jumped by a gang of bullies’ who slammed her head into sink
16-year-old girl dies after being ‘jumped by a gang of bullies’ who slammed her head into sink
A 16-year-old girl, who died after getting into a fight with another girl over a boy, was jumped by bullies who slammed her head against a bathroom sink at a school in Delaware Thursday morning.
Friends identified her as Amy Inita Joyner-Francis to local media, according to The News-Journal.
The fight broke out around 8.15am before classes at Howard High School of Technology, a vocational school in Wilmington, Delaware.
Students who witnessed the deadly scuffle said that the 16-year-old and another girl started fighting in one of the women’s bathrooms over a boy, when a gang of other girls jumped the victim.
At one point, someone banged her head on a sink, according to witnesses who spoke with6ABC.
‘There was an altercation that initially started between two people, and my understanding is that additional individuals joined in against the one person,’ Gary Fullman, chief of staff to the Wilmington mayor, told KTLA.
Kaya Wilson was in a stall when the fight broke out and spoke with the local news station after leaving school.
‘She was fighting a girl, and then that’s when all these other girls started banking her -like jumping her – and she hit her head on the sink,’ Wilson said.
Amy was flown to A.I. DuPont Children’s Hospital in critical condition, where she was later pronounced dead.The cause of death has not been confirmed
News media outlets quoted Police Chief Bobby Cummings as saying that two female students were taken to police headquarters for questioning.
‘My heart bleeds for the family,’ Mayor Dennis Williams told a news conference.
Sherry Dorsey Walker, a Wilmington city councilwoman, says she has known the victim and her family for quite some time and had been asked by the family to speak on their behalf.
Walker says the family is asking for spiritual healing in the community and no retaliation. She says they’re also ‘asking people to just be calm and pray for them’.
The councilwoman described the victim as ‘a wonderful human being’, adding that ‘her loss is a big void, not just in the family’.
Nathaniel Kenyatta, a freshman at the school, was friends with the victim and spoke to Delaware Online on Thursday.
He says he met her in a HVAC class and that she was an easy person to talk to.
‘She was very open,’ he said. ‘I feel bad for the people who have known her for years.’
A vigil was held for Amy on Thursday evening.
Her friends and neighbors knew her as the quiet teen who would focus on her homework.
Nik Stryminski told the News-Journal that Amy had kept him safe and out of a fight earlier this school year.
When he and another student were getting ready to fight she stepped in, backed him into a corner and calmed him down.
He said: ‘She didn’t believe in fighting, and the craziest thing is she died in a fight.’
Stryminski believes Amy went into the bathroom not to fight but to ‘talk things out’.
Troy Johnson, a sophomore at Howard, said Amy was a good influence to her peers with her calm personality, he said.
‘If I were to have kids I’d want them to hang around someone like her,’ he told the News Journal.
Another student said Amy was often the one who calmly counseled her friends.
Amil Gibbs, a sophomore at Howard, told the News-Journal that she would sit with Amy during lunch and tell her about problems she had in school.
And Amy would encourage her to ‘be strong’.
From Twitter to Facebook #RIPAmy is trending as several people across the nation have called her death senseless.
On social media, many say they can’t believe other students didn’t intervene to help her.
Others said it’s sickening to know that students stood there and watched and recorded as the fight erupted all because of a boy.
One Twitter user said she prays ‘for this generation’ and hopes ‘justice will be served’, while another said the world needs a ‘cultural shift’.
Howard isn’t known as a violent school and Police Chief Cummings said he did not know of any other problems in recent days.
Superintendent Victoria Gehrt called Amy’s death an ‘unbelievable tragedy for the family’. She also said that despite what happened, Howard High School of Technology ‘is a safe school for our students’.
School officials canceled classes Thursday and it’s unclear whether the school will reopen on Friday.
A mayoral debate on public safety that was scheduled to take place at the school Thursday night was also canceled.
