Just a week after a 14-year-old student was stabbed to death, another student almost suffered a similar fate at the Barrouallie Secondary School.{{more}}

On Monday March 9, 2009, Fidel Jack stormed into the student’s classroom and struck him several times about his body with a board. The student suffered swelling to his face, soft tissue damage to his head and abrasions about his body.

Jack was booked on a charge of wounding on March 10, 2009 at the Serious Offences Court. Chief Magistrate Sonya Young sentenced the 17-year-old Barrouallie labourer to one-week imprisonment after he pleaded guilty to the charge.

It was heard that Jack, who is not a student at the school, came onto the school’s compound at approximately 10:45am in the company of another man. While walking to his classroom, the student accidentally bumped into the man who Jack was with. Jack then got up from where he was and said, “Way yuh run in pon de man fa?” The student immediately apologized to man and went along his way.

Moments later, Jack walked into the classroom and attacked the defenseless student. The matter was then reported to the Deputy Principal and subsequently to the police.

In his explanation told the court, Jack said he was only joking when he struck the boy. “Is ah sort ah joke thing, but me ain’t hit him hard and me only give him four knock pon he hand,” Jack explained. He went on to say that he only struck the boy on his hand, although the doctor’s report stated otherwise.

Seemingly irate by Jack’s explanation, Magistrate Young served the teen with a fiery tongue-lashing. “I wish I could take you in front of the market and let them beat you. I am sending you to prison, I want them to have jokes with you round there,” Young chided.

The Chief Magistrate stated that it is of paramount importance for children to go to school and feel protected. “You ought not to be on a school’s compound and you don’t go to school there. You could have killed him,” she added.

Young said she was making a conscious effort to have matters like these dealt with correctly and that persons of such a young age should be taught a lesson. (KW)