Mother says harsher punishments needed for bullying after son attacked last year

VANCOUVER (NEWS 1130) — A heartbroken mother is calling for change after her son was beaten at a Vancouver high school last year, as yet another disturbing video of a playground attack has surfaced online.

The incident is the third violent bullying incident caught on video in the Vancouver area and released over the last week.

Shannon Copeland was shocked when she found out her 14-year-old son was attacked at Killarney Secondary School, and says schools need to do more to address bullying. She has since moved her son to a different school across Vancouver, and is calling for serious consequences for those involved in incidents of playground bullying.

Yet another case of violent bullying at school has surfaced, this time in Vancouver. A mother says her 14-year-old son was thrown to the ground, punched, kicked and kneed in the head last year at Killarney Secondary School. @NEWS1130 pic.twitter.com/AOuQAF0N96

— Tarnjit Kaur Parmar (@Tarnjitkparmar) June 8, 2019

Video of the attack shows her son surrounded and repeatedly kicked by several older students.

“There was four different kids that attacked him. They kicked him, they kneed him in the head, he fell to the ground and they kept beating on him,” she says. “I saw it on social media. He didn’t tell me because he was scared that if he told there would be retaliation.”

RELATED: Second incident of violent bullying caught on video

When she took her concerns to the school, she says the students involved were suspended, but no further action was taken.

“We were not supported. We were told, well do you really want these kids to have criminal records just because this happened?” she says. “I had to pull my son out of his home school and put him in a different school across the city. We were made to feel unsafe.”

RELATED: Harsher consequences needed, says father of student attacked at Surrey school

Copeland adds when she took the issue one step further, her concerns were dismissed.

“I told the school board that they said you need to let this go, everybody needs to move on,” she says.”We fought to the bitter end, and were made to feel like we were being troublemakers. It never went further, we weren’t allowed to have a meeting with the other parents. It was really disappointing. There was no justice.”

Since then the boys in question were suspended, but this mother is angry she never got to be part of the conversation with the school. She's since pulled her son out and enrolled him in another school. Says more needs to be done to prevent and address these instances of violence.

— Tarnjit Kaur Parmar (@Tarnjitkparmar) June 8, 2019

While her son now attends a different school, Copeland says the attack has a lasting impact on her family. She says in order to prevent more violence in class acts of bullying and violence need to be addressed and met with serious consequences.