A placard against bullying at a demonstration following the suicide of a minor in Sallent and the frustrated attempt of his sister Siu Wu (EFE)
Four 14-year-old minors and one 17-year-old were arrested on 7 February on charges of sexually assaulting a classmate at an institute in Rubí (Barcelona). The teenager’s mother – the same age as the alleged perpetrators – told Mossos d’Esquadra that a group of boys pushed her daughter to the ground, molested and beat her when she tried to escape. According to the complaint, it happened in a classroom and in the presence of a teacher. The police are assuming a suspected sexual assault. The Education Ministry declined to comment until it had more details on the incident.
The alleged attack took place on February 2 during school hours and classrooms. The minors’ parents said that when there was a class change between two groups of 3rd ESO who wanted to share a theme at the time, a group of five minors took advantage of them to attack them. They surrounded her, threw her on the ground and brought her genital area closer to her face to dramatize fellatio. When the minor tried to get up and walk away from the group, one of them reportedly hit her and threw her to the ground.
According to various witnesses, the teacher was in the classroom at the time and allegedly did not realize what had happened. The same witnesses assured that it was not the first time that the young people, formed as a kind of group that instilled fear in other students, acted in the same way. Other youth reported that they too were surrounded and thrown to the ground. So far there is no evidence that the applicant, who was a minor, was the victim of repeated harassment against her.
The Mossos d’Esquadra arrested the five minors after the young woman’s mother reported the incident, made various statements and also met the parents of those involved, who were informed of the planned action. The minors were arrested on 7 February and handed over to the Public Prosecutor’s Office for Minors the same day, who released them pending judicial review of the complaint.
Four of the five people involved in the Rubí case have reached the age limit for criminal responsibility for their actions. Persons under the age of 14 are not liable. In such cases, the youth prosecutor’s office usually investigates the whole group, not just the direct perpetrators, because they believe that those who only witness the attack without doing anything about it are also a necessary part of it. The aggression. In the case of unaccountable minors, the Directorate General for Child and Adolescent Care (DGAiA) of the Generalitat is usually informed so that it can take the necessary administrative measures.
The suicide of a minor in Sallent and his twin sister’s frustrated attempt have all raised alarms about bullying situations in schools. Both were bullied, according to multiple witnesses and relatives, which worsened when one of them said he wanted to be treated like a boy. The Generalitat has been forced to back down, moving from denying any kind of bullying at the Sallent Institute to investigating what happened and apologizing for “a failure of the entire system”. The Generalitat warns of the steady increase in suicide attempts among minors, which have multiplied since 2019 (from 139 to 439 for minors aged 5 to 14 and from 941 to 1,810 for young people aged 15 to 24).
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