After undergoing what seemed to be unbearable torment from his peers, a sophomore high school student leapt to his death as classmates looked on and witnessed the terrifying incident. Continue reading after the jump.
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Candles, flowers and notes lay at the spot where a 15-year-old boy fell to his death from a three-story school building in what authorities said appeared to be a suicide.
The 10th-grader got a running start before jumping off the ledge of the building at Crescenta Valley High School on Friday afternoon, said Sgt. John Corina of the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department. He was identified by the county Coroner’s Office as Drew Ferraro of La Crescenta.
Ferraro was alone when he fell in a central location on the campus where two buildings are connected by elevated walkways, said Richard Sheehan, superintendent of the Glendale Unified School District.
Distraught students struggled to understand the tragedy.
Student Meghan Dorosy told KCAL (Channel 9) she saw blood and went into shock.
“I started shaking and I felt sick to my stomach and walked away, and then I called my parents and just went into tears,” she said.
School district officials said there was no indication that the boy had been bullied, but Dorosy said that wasn’t the case.
“He definitely was bullied and he didn’t want to go to school, and I know how it feels because I was bullied and I didn’t want to go to school,” Dorosy told KCAL.
Authorities did not release a motive for the boy’s actions.
“I’m sure when this is all said and done, we will still not have all the answers,” Sheehan said.
The school district
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posted a statement on its website expressing condolences to the family.
“Our thoughts are with the family at this very difficult time. Our first concern is for the well-being of all of our students,” Sheehan said in the statement. “Together with our supportive community, we will help our students get through this.”
The boy jumped at the beginning of the lunch period at the school, which has 2,950 students, Sheehan said. Michael Kim, a ninth-grader, said he “heard a thump” as he was leaving his classroom on the third floor to go to lunch.
Jubilant about the weekend ahead, Kim said he and friends were singing a Top 40 hit as they headed to the quad. When the 14-year-old and his friends got there, they saw a big crowd and the boy’s body.
“I was pretty much just shocked. My jaw just – it dropped,” Kim said. “We never expect something like that in this kind of neighborhood at this school,” he said.
A crisis center was immediately set up in the cafeteria. The school halted classes, and students were directed from the quad where the boy died to an athletic field, where parents came to pick them up. Classes were scheduled to resume Tuesday, since Monday is a school holiday.
The boy’s body, his torso bare, could be seen from a walkway outside the school’s fence until butcher paper was put up, blocking the view.
Paramedics and teachers tried to administer first aid to the boy after the fall, but he was declared dead on campus.
