The newspaper article that had a profound effect on me

HATED TO DEATH

Disregard the phrase, “Sticks and stones can break my bones, but names will never hurt me.”  I was flung into an emotional whirlwind this morning while going through an old shoebox of forgotten papers.  The newspaper article that I had saved [dated Thursday, October 2, 1997] had a profound effect on me.  Research about this event caused an even more intense emotion than I originally felt.  Kelly Yeoman was a tormented teen who took her life because she was taunted about her weight.

Her teenage tormentors threw salt in her school lunch and dumped her clothes in the garbage.  Last week (1997) they pelted her house, first with stones and finally with butter and eggs–the ingredients for cake.

The chubby, sweet-faced 13 year old told her parents she couldn’t stand the abuse anymore.  while they slept Sunday night, she took a fatal overdose of pain killers.

Police have arrested four neighborhood boys and one girl, ranging in age from 13 to 17, and say more arrests are possible.  However, the arrested youths were not charged with any crime and were released without bail.  It was not clear what would happen to them since all are juveniles, authorities said.

“She was a bubbly, charming little angel who would do anything for anybody,” said Ivan Yeomans, Kelly’s father.  “We were just an easy target and they are cowards, but I hope they can sleep at night after what has happened.”

Kelly lived with her parents and 16-year-old sister Sarah in the working-class Allenton neighborhood of Derby, 210 kilometers northwest of London.  She played the tambourine in the local Salvation Army band and visited elderly patrons at its Allenton centre.

But her sister said Kelly was regularly teased about her weight and was abused at school and in her neighborhood.  As a result, she always left her gym class after everyone else to avoid being seen in exercise clothes.

“We tried to help her over the bullying she got,” her best friend, 15-year-old Marie Porter, told the Guardian newspaper yesterday.  “She didn’t talk about it much, but they didn’t let her alone.”

Neighbors said a gang of as many as 15 youths gathered outside the family’s house for several consecutive nights last week.  They attacked the home several times, throwing a block of margarine through the window, shouting abuse about lard and fat, and calling her “smelly.”

“It was after that Kelly told us ‘Mom and Dad, it’s nothing to do with you but I can’t stand it.  I’m going to take an overdose,” said her mother, Julie Yeomans.

But, her mother said, she and her husband never thought Kelly would kill herself.  They knew only that she was depressed.

Michael Shaw, head teacher at Merill College, the high shcool that Kelly attended, said yesterday that she had complained about bullying at school only once–after the salt was thrown in her food in February 1996.

Last week, she told a teacher her family was being tormented at home, and the teacher suggested they contact the police or a lawyer, he said.  It was unclear whether they had done so.

“We take bullying very seriously,” Shaw said, “and all cases are dealt with swiftly, appropriately and thoroughly.”

He said those arrested were not schoolmates of Kelly’s.

Prime Minister Tony Blair’s Labour government has started a campaign against bullying in schools, including a leaflet for parents on what to do if their children are bullied, or are bullying others.

Pauline Hasler, director of the Anti-Bullying Campaign, siad such harassment is widespread in Britain.  Ten people die every year as a result of bullying, she said, and the campaign’s hotline receives 16,000 calls annually.

From Associated Press

I just found out that Kelly died after taking 13 times the minimum lethal dosage (40 pills) of the drug Coproxymoy, which her mother used for a knee complaint (source).  Click here to see what sentence her accusers received.

Were you bullied?  What effect did it have?  Did you know Kelly Yeomans?  Please post your comments about this subject.