Glover Student Attacked By Classmates

The mother of a 12-year-old girl who was beaten near Glover Middle School is afraid to send her daughter back to class unless Spokane School District 81 provides a bodyguard.

“She’s not safe there,” Kristin Wimp said Monday. “I don’t think she’s safe anywhere in the district now.”

A group of eight to 10 Glover students attacked Wimp’s daughter, Linda Nelson, at a Spokane Transit Authority bus stop near the school about noon Friday.

Nelson checked out sick and was headed home at the time. The other students were released from school early that day as well.

One of the kids put out a cigarette on Nelson and “kicked her in the head repeatedly until she was unconscious,” Wimp said.

At least one of the attackers, which included boys and girls, ran over her daughter with a bicycle, Wimp added. “She’s got tread marks on her,” the woman said. The girl still had marks on her shoulder and chest Monday.

Nelson was hospitalized for several hours after the beating. Her mother said the girl couldn’t see clearly out of her right eye three days after the attack.

It was unclear Tuesday if a criminal investigation would be launched. Police spokesman Dick Cottam said District 81 security officers were investigating the case.

But District 81 spokesman Hugh Davis said school security officers have no authority to investigate crimes that occur off campus.

“We believe it’s a police matter,” Davis said.

Wimp pulled her daughter out of school and hasn’t sent her back.

“They said she’s no longer welcome there because they can’t guarantee her safety,” Wimp said. “I’m not sending her back there without a bodyguard or something.”

Nelson was upset that she can’t go back to Glover.

“I don’t know how I’m going to get my education,” she said. “I’m only in the seventh grade.”

Glover Principal Phil Newsum said Nelson is not restricted from coming back to the school. Her mother has chosen to keep her out, he said.

“Linda, by her own admission, said she was afraid to come back to school here,” Newsum said.

He said he referred Wimp to the district’s student services office. Officials there will help Nelson find another school.

The assault apparently stemmed from an argument the victim had with some of the other students earlier in the day, Newsum said.

“There had been some verbal exchanges and confrontations between Linda and the students allegedly involved,” he said. “It was mutual, as far as yelling back and forth.”

Newsum said there was no indication that the argument would turn violent.

“If there had been, we probably would have kept Linda here and had her mother come and pick her up,” he said.

Nelson, who has a history of running away and bouncing between schools, said the other kids were angry about a gang symbol one of her friends scrawled on her notebook.

“They were mad because I had a blue gang sign on my red notebook,” she said. “It wasn’t even my fault that it was on there.”

A boy and a girl who bragged about their part in the attack were disciplined.

The boy, who had a long record of behavior problems, was expelled from Glover, Newsum said. The girl was suspended for five days.

Other students who were involved also may face disciplinary action, he said.

Newsum plans to send a letter explaining the incident to parents who have children attending his school.

“I don’t want our parents to blow this out of perspective,” he said. “This is an isolated incident.”

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