Northeast
Family of New Jersey girl, 14, bullied to suicide alleges school failed to act
This story discusses suicide. If you or someone you know is having thoughts of suicide, please contact the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline at 988 or 1-800-273-TALK (8255).
Jocelyn Walters, a 14-year-old New Jersey tri-athlete and huge fan of The Smashing Pumpkins, died by suicide on Sept. 9, 2022 after enduring months of harassment and bullying from her peers.
Now, Jocelyn’s parents, Fred and Solangie “Soly” Walters, are suing the Middletown Township School District, the school board and other defendants — including Jocelyn’s teachers and nurses at a local mental health clinic — for allegedly failing to take appropriate action to prevent the 14-year-old from taking her own life.
The lawsuit also lists 10 John and Jane Does “who harassed, intimidated, bullied and/or otherwise abused Jocelyn” as defendants.
“Jocelyn was the student that you wanted. She was the teammate that you wanted. The player that you wanted. She was always there. First one on the field. Last one off,” Fred Walters told Fox News Digital.
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Jocelyn Walters died by suicide on Sept. 9, 2022, at age 14. (Family handout)
By the time she entered high school in 2021, Jocelyn had dreams of going on to study law at Notre Dame, but those dreams were cut short when she fell victim to intense bullying and harassment by other students, in person and online.
“Jocelyn’s death by suicide took place after an extended and persistent pattern of harassment, intimidation, bullying and abuse directed against her that took place during, and following, the 2021/2022 school year at the High School,” the complaint states. “The repeated pattern of … abuse occurred despite ongoing and repeated complaints of same made by the Plaintiffs, and others, to the Board/District and Board Defendants.”
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Jocelyn Walters was a star soccer goalie for her travel soccer team in New Jersey. (Family handout)
The lawsuit alleges that one bully in particular, identified only as J.M., tormented Jocelyn by sharing her personal information, making fun of her on private social media webpages, removed Jocelyn from group chats, cropped her face out of photos posted on social media and attempted to isolate her from her friends and boyfriend.
“The High School, the Board/District and the Board Defendants were aware of this conduct and did nothing to protect Jocelyn from harm,” the complaint says.
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Jocelyn Walters was a tri-athlete and star goalie on her travel soccer team. (Family handout)
Fred Walters said he hosted sleepovers with Jocelyn’s bullies, who were once her friends, under his own roof before they allegedly began tormenting his daughter.
“This group of kids actually slept in my house between Christmas and New Year’s,” he explained, “and somewhere in January, from what I understand, there might have been some sort of text exchange … in a group chat, and then this girl just seemed to want to push her out. And what I understood before, and even more so after, was this seemed to be this girl’s M.O.”
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Fred Walters alleged that J.M. made Jocelyn feel comfortable confessing things to her and being vulnerable before she turned on Jocelyn and tried to isolate her from their mutual group of friends.
Jocelyn Walters had dreams of studying at Notre Dame and becoming a lawyer. (Family handout)
Jocelyn first tried to take her own life in May 2022, months before her death. She was hospitalized and treated after the initial attempt.
“‘I’m honestly going to try and keep instigating her…’”
“Even while Jocelyn was in the hospital … J.M. posted in a group chat the following day regarding Jocelyn: ‘I wonder if she’s going to do anything back . . . I’m honestly going to try and keep instigating her until she actually does something to me that I can get her in trouble for,’” the complaint alleges.
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The lawsuit further claims that in August 2022, after her hospitalization, Jocelyn was referred to a nurse at a mental health clinic who “negligently doubled Jocelyn’s antidepressant medication without knowing the dosage she was taking” and “failed to notify Jocelyn’s parents of her emergent condition.”
A lawsuit filed by Jocelyn Walter’s parents states that the 14-year-old girl was subjected to relentless bullying that school officials did nothing to stop. (Family handout)
On the day before and the day of her death, Jocelyn also reported to the school nurse, “who failed to take appropriate action given Jocelyn’s history and further failed to alert Jocelyn’s parents of this/these visits,” the complaint alleges.
“Hours later, on September 9, 2022, Jocelyn took her own life,” the lawsuit states. “Immediately thereafter, J.M. texted the following regarding Jocelyn’s death: ‘[s]he died stop making controversy about it.’”
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The day before and the day of her death, Jocelyn Walters reported to the school nurse, her family’s lawsuit alleges. (Family handout)
Jocelyn’s family alleges that Jocelyn, her sister, her parents and her friends all reported the bullying that Jocelyn was enduring in and outside school, but their concerns went ignored. School officials allegedly did nothing to punish the students who participated in the harassment that led up to Jocelyn’s suicide.
Following Jocelyn’s death, on Oct. 26, 2022, Middletown High School North sent her parents a letter acknowledging that Jocelyn “may have been a victim of an act of” bullying, and the school launched an investigation into those allegations.
“[T]he District did not find any evidence that Jocelyn was the target of the investigated act of harassment, intimidation, or bullying.”
“After careful consideration of evidence yielded from the investigation, the District did not find any evidence that Jocelyn was the target of the investigated act of harassment, intimidation, or bullying,” the letter states.
READ THE LETTER:
Walters’ lawyer, Jeffrey Youngman, told Fox News Digital that bullying does not “just go away unless you apply the proper form of discipline.”
“Children react to discipline,” he said. “It’s a personal deterrent, and it’s a broader deterrent. But if you’re not administering … that discipline at all, it’s just going to foster their behavior. And that’s what happened here. Nobody was disciplined.”
The day Jocelyn died started out like any typical school day. Fred Walters dropped his two daughters off at school that morning and went to work. After school, Jocelyn’s sister went to see a show at a concert venue with her friend, but Walters could not get a hold of Jocelyn despite calling and texting her.
An older photo of Jocelyn Walters. (Family handout)
He figured she might be taking a nap in her room due to her busy schedule with sports and her job on the local beach boardwalk. She had also been experiencing some fatigue due to her increase in medication. However, when Fred Walters opened her bedroom door that afternoon, he found her deceased.
“I felt that that medication was a very, very big component.”
“That is an image that I work very hard to get out and … from the very beginning, I felt that that medication was a very, very big component,” he said.
The lawsuit notes that while the national suicide rate among people ages 10-24 saw no significant change between 2001 and 2007, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recorded a 62% increase in suicide for that age group between 2007 and 2021. Among girls, 30% said they have seriously considered attempting suicide — up 60% from 2011, according to CDC data.
Among girls, 30% said they have seriously considered attempting suicide — up 60% from 2011, according to CDC data. (Family handout)
The complaint also notes that “[t]he use of antidepressants in children and adolescents has increased substantially since 2005, despite the lack of convincing evidence that the benefits outweigh the risks and treatment-emergent suicidality remains a major concern.”
The school board and district said they do not comment on pending litigation.
The board introduced a cellphone ban in district schools on June 26, citing studies that show an increase in students’ academic performance, a significant decrease in suicidal ideation, fewer harassment and bullying incidents and better socialization when their cellphones are not accessible throughout the day.
Jocelyn Walters playing soccer when she was younger. (Family handout)
An attorney for the school district and school board, Eric Harrison, said they “intend to respond to these claims solely through the legal process.”
Fred Walters feels there were failures “every step of the way” that led to Jocelyn’s death.
“I’m fighting for my daughter, but through this, I just see so many failures.”
“These girls start doing what they did and pushing her out and trying to cancel her. And, then you’ve got the adults in the room that are not doing their job or following their really failed policies and politics, and their cover-your-ass paperwork,” he said. “I’m fighting for my daughter, but through this, I just see so many failures … and other parents that are coming to me with their problems that haven’t been addressed because it’s an isolation of the parents.”
Now, Walters is just hoping to keep his daughter’s name and memory alive while he pursues justice. He created a nonprofit called 99 Smiles that aims to normalize the conversation about youth mental-health and expand resources.
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Before Jesse Tyler Ferguson starred on “Modern Family,” he was a bartender at the Winter Garden Theater in Midtown Manhattan, when “Cats” was in performances there. It was 1995, and he had come to New York from Albuquerque. He was cast in the Off Broadway production of “On the Town,” which later moved to Broadway.
“These professional dancers and singers in ‘Cats’ were auditioning for the same role as me, and I got it,” he said. “It’s like my Shirley MacLaine story.”
After starring in the original Broadway production of “The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee,” Mr. Ferguson was cast as the uptight lawyer Mitchell Pritchett on the ABC sitcom. After the show ended in 2020, he won a Tony Award for “Take Me Out.”
Now he is starring as Truman Capote in the play “Tru.” He recently spent his day off with The New York Times.
Almost 15 years have passed since Milan Lucic blew up goalie Ryan Miller on Garden ice, an infamous hit that would help send the Buffalo Sabres into their Dark Ages. On Sunday in Game 4 at the Garden, the Sabres finally got a little payback.
With a chance to tie the best-of-seven series on Causeway Street, the Bruins were embarrassed by the Sabres thanks to a comically bad first period that put them in a hole from which they had no chance to extricate themselves. The B’s took a well-deserved 6-1 loss and are now down in the series 3-1. They will be down to their last out of the season when they face the Sabres in Game 5 on Tuesday at Keybank Center.
“Man to man in here, if we’re not f—- embarrassed with what just happened, I don’t know what to say,” said Charlie McAvoy, who along with his partner Jonathan Aspirot was minus-4. “It’s not over after three games. We have everything to play for here and we know we’re such a better team than what we did today.”
“Embarrassed” was the operative word after the game.
The B’s had won 29 games on Causeway Street this season, tied with the Carolina Hurricanes for most home Ws in the NHL. But they couldn’t win either of their home games in the series and, if they don’t get their game in order before Game 5, they will have played their last game at the Garden for the season.
Meanwhile, the Sabres, after 14 years out of the playoffs, are on the verge of their first playoff series win since 2007.
The Bruins’ have suffered more dramatically painful losses on home ice in recent memory. The Game 7 Stanley Cup Final loss in 2019 comes to mind. But it’s hard to think of one that was less competitive. The Sabres’ forecheck made mincemeat of the Bruins’ defense in the first period.
How do you explain a team not being ready to compete and/or execute in such a big game?
“I can’t,” said coach Marco Sturm. “I don’t know. I really don’t know. I could feel a little bit of it in Game 3, for no reason, and definitely today. If you’re a Boston Bruin and playing at home, you should be very excited going into a playoff game. We didn’t, so I can’t really answer that question right now.”
The first period was a theater of the macabre for Bruins fans, at least those fans who hadn’t sold their tickets to Sabres fans.
They fell down 4-0 and it could have been much worse than that. The B’s were outshot 19-5 and they were charged with 10 giveaways, which felt like some charitable counting from the stat crew.
The first goal against at 4:17 was a harbinger of things to come. McAvoy’s simple D-to-D pass didn’t connect with Aspirot and the puck drifted dangerously toward the blue line. One of their best defensive forwards, Fraser Minten, jumped in to help. But after he collected the loose puck, Minten’s reverse bank pass went right to Alex Tuch, who fed Peyton Krebs for the one-timer goal. The Sabres’ fans in the building popped loudly and it was the beginning of a long afternoon for the home team.
The Sabres made it 2-0 seconds after a Buffalo power play ended at 7:10. Hampus Lindholm’s soft clear attempt was knocked down and then Ryan McLeod fed Josh Doan at the top of the crease for a redirect.
On the third goal, Jordan Harris, inserted into the lineup for Mason Lohrei, coughed up the puck upon Doan’s stick check and it went right to Zach Benson, who moved in and tossed an in-tight backhander at Jeremy Swayman, who made the initial stop but the rebound bounced off Benson and trickled in.
Sturm was in no mood to discuss what wrong from an X-and-O standpoint.
“I can’t even going into the rush game, the O-zone, D-zone, I really can’t,” said Sturm. “In all areas, we were just behind. Emotionally, if you’re not ready for it…it didn’t matter. So I don’t talk about little details because they were not there today.”
Sturm called his timeout at that point at 9:15 after the Benson goal.
“We were just hurting and I had to stop this, first of all,” said Sturm. “Message-wise, there’s a few things I had to address and the other thing, you had to wake them up. For some reason, two games in a row, we were just totally flat. In a playoff game. That just can’t happen.”
But happen it did, and the timeout couldn’t stop the hemorrhaging.
Buffalo made it 4-0 at 14:24 when Aspirot knocked a Sabre into Swayman, leaving the goaltender flailing. Bowen Byram used the opportunity to score his third of the series into the shortside.
Predictably, the Bruins fans that were in the house booed their team off the ice at the of the first.
To make matters worse, the B’s were without Viktor Arvidsson to start the second after he had taken a high hit from Mattias Samuelsson late in the first.
Pride kicked in a little bit in the second period and the B’s finally spent a little time in the Sabres zone, especially late in the period. But Alex Lyon (22 mostly easy saves) made the stops he needed to, when the Sabres didn’t block the shots in front of him. The B’s earned one power play late in the second but they did nothing with it and they still faced the daunting four-goal deficit to start the third.
For the most optimistic of Bruins fans, even their hopes were doused when Beck Malenstyn scored on a deflection early in the third, followed up quickly by a Tuch goal, both goals coming off turnovers.
Sturm then gave Swayman the mercy pull, which frankly could have happened after the disastrous first. The netminder appeared to let his teammates have it before he went down the tunnel.
Only a Sean Kuraly goal with 39.9 seconds left, with the B’s killing a Nikita Zadorov major after he cross-checked and punched Rasmus Dahlin, kept the B’s from suffering their first shutout of the season.
That didn’t change the overriding feeling utter failure one iota.
“A waste of opportunity,” said David Pastrnak, who took nine shots, only one of which got through to the net. “Unacceptable. We expect more from ourselves. We are better than that. You can’t show up like that, in an afternoon game. The first period is so f— important…to show up like that as a team is unacceptable.”
We will see on Tuesday what, if anything, they can do about it.
A woman has died, and three others were injured following a shooting at a bar in Vandergrift, Armstrong County, according to Pennsylvania State Police.
Troopers said they were called shortly after 1:15 a.m. Sunday to Niki’s Quick Six on First Street in Vandergrift for reports of shots fired.
A local police officer who arrived first found one woman dead and multiple people suffering from gunshot wounds, according to a public information report provided by state police.
The woman who died was identified as Jessica Hilliard, 34, of Apollo. Hilliard was pronounced dead at the scene. Another victim, Rebecca Boston, 24, of McIntyre, was found at the scene and was last listed in critical condition.
Two other victims, Hector Saballos, 34, of Vandergrift, and Dominik Dellach, 25, of Vandergrift, left before troopers arrived. Police said both were later listed in stable condition.
The suspect has been identified as David Dunmire, 36, of Vandergrift. Police said he remained at the scene and was taken into custody without incident.
An investigation determined that a physical altercation broke out in the parking lot outside the bar before Dunmire allegedly pulled out a firearm and fired multiple rounds, striking several people.
State police said they consulted with Armstrong County District Attorney Katie Charlton, who approved a criminal homicide charge.
The investigation remains ongoing.
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