Jesse Ramdeo
A secondary school student is likely to face permanent injury to his eye following an altercation with a classmate. The wounded boy's mother, Natoya Francis, is calling for answers from the school located in west Trinidad and the parents of her son's alleged attacker.
During an interview with Guardian Media on Monday, Francis said that an official police report has already been made as she wants justice for her boy.
Francis said she was alerted about the incident last week Wednesday.
"On Wednesday the 18th I came to work and about after ten I get a phone call that my son get damaged in his eye. I asked the guidance officer who called me if someone hit him in his eye and they said no, he just got injured in his eye and if I could come to the school now."
She said after making her way out of her Port-of-Spain workplace, she received another call informing her to head to the Port-of-Spain General Hospital instead.
"They told me they had to call the ambulance for my son because when he get hit he was complaining about his head and he want to sleep, so the paramedics say do not let him sleep, keep him awake until we reach."
Francis said she was horrified to see the state of her son at the hospital.
"When I reach the hospital, no teacher, no dean, no guidance officer, nobody was with my son. The bone that keeping up his eye is broken. He get a hard lash in his eye and behind the eye is bleeding."
Francis said when she visited the school a day after the incident to inquire about what transpired, she was shown a video which captured the assault.
She said, "When I watch the video, ah see the boy run past the teacher and cuff him in his eye and he fall down by a car and the boy constantly cuffing him up in his head, cuffing him up in his head...nobody ent even pull off the boy when he was cuffing my child in the head."
Francis said that based on information she received, her son was violently attacked after an argument between him and another student escalated. She explained that the injuries the 17-year-old sustained could now cost him his vision.
"The bone that is keeping up your eye, that is broken. He get a hard lash in his eye so behind the eye is bleeding. One of the nurses said if he needs emergency surgery I will have to pay $45,000. I don't have that money to put out for my son's eye that another person son injured."
Francis admitted that while her son had to be reprimanded in the past for fighting, the footage obtained from the school suggested he was not the attacker.
The mother said the school's handling of the matter was unsatisfactory and she is now calling for an end to school violence.
Guardian Media reached out to the Ministry of Education on the matter and is awaiting a response.
