Houston parents say 13-year-old gay son was "bullied to death", school district took no action

[sonomak]

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/metropolitan/7220896.html

Parents say bullies drove their son to take his life
They claim school district took no action
By PEGGY O'HARE, HOUSTON CHRONICLE

Asher Brown's worn-out tennis shoes still sit in the living room of his Cypress-area home while his student progress report — filled with straight A's — rests on the coffee table. The eighth-grader killed himself last week. He shot himself in the head after enduring what his mother and stepfather say was constant harassment from four other students at Hamilton Middle School in the Cypress-Fairbanks Independent School District.

Brown, his family said, was "bullied to death" — picked on for his small size, his religion and because he did not wear designer clothes and shoes. Kids also accused him of being gay, some of them performing mock gay acts on him in his physical education class, his mother and stepfather said. The 13-year-old's parents said they had complained about the bullying to Hamilton Middle School officials during the past 18 months, but claimed their concerns fell on deaf ears. David and Amy Truong said they made several visits to the school to complain about the harassment, and Amy Truong said she made numerous phone calls to the school that were never returned.

Cy Fair ISD officials said Monday that they never received any complaints from Brown's parents before the suicide about the way the boy was being treated at school. School district spokeswoman Kelli Durham, whose husband Alan Durham is a Hamilton assistant principal, said no students, school employees or the boy's parents ever reported that he was being bullied. That statement infuriated the Truongs, who accused the school district of protecting the bullies and their parents. "That's absolutely inaccurate — it's completely false," Amy Truong said. "I did not hallucinate phone calls to counselors and assistant principals. We have no reason to make this up. … It's like they're calling us liars."... Numerous comments from parents and students on the Web site of KRIV-TV Channel 26, which also reported a story about Brown's death, stated that the boy had been bullied by classmates for several years and claimed Cy-Fair ISD does nothing to stop such harassment...

Brown was found dead on the floor of his stepfather's closet at the family's home in the 11700 block of Cypresswood about 4:30 p.m. Thursday. He used his stepfather's 9 mm Beretta, stored on one of the closet's shelves, to kill himself. He left no note. David Truong found the teen's body when he arrived home from work. On the morning of his death, the teen told his stepfather he was gay, but Truong said he was fine with the disclosure. "We didn't condemn," he said.

[pnwmom]

1. The boy killed himself after telling his stepfather he was gay?

Sadly, there might be more to this story than we'll ever know.

[Drale]

2. If a school district will not take action

there is one very easy way to get them to act. Threaten to sue, it does matter if you would have a case or not,99.9% of the time they will back down and do something because they do not want to either take the time and they defiantly do no want the media coverage that comes with something like that.

[merqz]

3. If they were smart

They have evidence they made these complaints.

[brentspeak]

4. The school officials sound like a pack of blatant bureacratic liars

[Happyhippychick]

5. They stored a 9mm pistol on a closet shelf??

WTF?