(NAME-MCE) A Boy the Bullies Love to Beat Up, Repeatedly

[Anselmo Villanueva]

A Boy the Bullies Love to Beat Up, Repeatedly

Billy Wolfe, a 16-year-old with learning disabilities, has for several years
repeatedly been the victim of classmates' physical assaults and bullying, he
and his parents say. They have several binders documenting attacks and
subsequent medical treatments. Not satisfied with the response of school
officials to the incidents, the Wolfe family this month sued the bullies and
are contemplating also bringing suit against their school district.

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http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/24/us/24land.html?_r=2&adxnnl=1&oref=slogin&adxnnlx=1206386056-Ht/6X4SxDQtSGS2lECIE+g

A Boy the Bullies Love to Beat Up, Repeatedly

Published: March 24, 2008  New York Times

FAYETTEVILLE, Ark.

All lank and bone, the boy stands at the corner with his younger sister,
waiting for the yellow bus that takes them to their respective schools. He
is Billy Wolfe, high school sophomore, struggling.

Moments earlier he left the sanctuary that is his home, passing those framed
photographs of himself as a carefree child, back when he was 5. And now he
is at the bus stop, wearing a baseball cap, vulnerable at 15.

A car the color of a school bus pulls up with a boy who tells his brother
beside him that he's going to beat up Billy Wolfe. While one records the
assault with a cellphone camera, the other walks up to the oblivious Billy
and punches him hard enough to leave a fist-size welt on his forehead.

The video shows Billy staggering, then dropping his book bag to fight back,
lanky arms flailing. But the screams of his sister stop things cold.

The aggressor heads to school, to show friends the video of his Billy
moment, while Billy heads home, again. It's not yet 8 in the morning.

Bullying is everywhere, including here in Fayetteville, a city of 60,000
with one of the country's better school systems. A decade ago a Fayetteville
student was mercilessly harassed and beaten for being gay. After a complaint
was filed with the Office of Civil Rights, the district adopted procedures
to promote tolerance and respect — none of which seems to have been of much
comfort to Billy Wolfe.

It remains unclear why Billy became a target at age 12; schoolyard
anthropology can be so nuanced. Maybe because he was so tall, or wore
glasses then, or has a learning disability that affects his reading
comprehension. Or maybe some kids were just bored. Or angry.

Whatever the reason, addressing the bullying of Billy has become a second
job for his parents: Curt, a senior data analyst, and Penney, the owner of
an office-supply company. They have binders of school records and police
reports, along with photos documenting the bruises and black eyes. They are
well known to school officials, perhaps even too well known, but they make
no apologies for being vigilant. They also reject any suggestion that they
should move out of the district because of this.

The many incidents seem to blur together into one protracted assault. When
Billy attaches a bully's name to one beating, his mother corrects him. "That
was Benny, sweetie," she says. "That was in the eighth grade."

It began years ago when a boy called the house and asked Billy if he wanted
to buy a certain sex toy, heh-heh. Billy told his mother, who informed the
boy's mother. The next day the boy showed Billy a list with the names of 20
boys who wanted to beat Billy up.

Ms. Wolfe says she and her husband knew it was coming. She says they tried
to warn school officials — and then bam: the prank caller beat up Billy in
the bathroom of McNair Middle School.

Not long after, a boy on the school bus pummeled Billy, but somehow Billy
was the one suspended, despite his pleas that the bus's security camera
would prove his innocence. Days later, Ms. Wolfe recalls, the principal
summoned her, presented a box of tissues, and played the bus video that
clearly showed Billy was telling the truth.

Things got worse. At Woodland Junior High School, some boys in a wood shop
class goaded a bigger boy into believing that Billy had been talking trash
about his mother. Billy, busy building a miniature house, didn't see it
coming: the boy hit him so hard in the left cheek that he briefly lost
consciousness.

Ms. Wolfe remembers the family dentist sewing up the inside of Billy's
cheek, and a school official refusing to call the police, saying it looked
like Billy got what he deserved. Most of all, she remembers the sight of her
son.

"He kept spitting blood out," she says, the memory strong enough still to
break her voice.

By now Billy feared school. Sometimes he was doubled over with stress,
asking his parents why. But it kept on coming.

In ninth grade, a couple of the same boys started a Facebook page called
"Every One That Hates Billy Wolfe." It featured a photograph of Billy's face
superimposed over a likeness of Peter Pan, and provided this description of
its purpose: "There is no reason anyone should like billy he's a little
bitch. And a homosexual that NO ONE LIKES."

Heh-heh.

According to Alan Wilbourn, a spokesman for the school district, the
principal notified the parents of the students involved after Ms. Wolfe
complained, and the parents — whom he described as "horrified" — took steps
to have the page taken down.

Not long afterward, a student in Spanish class punched Billy so hard that
when he came to, his braces were caught on the inside of his cheek.

So who is Billy Wolfe? Now 16, he likes the outdoors, racquetball and girls.
For whatever reason — bullying, learning disabilities or lack of interest —
his grades are poor. Some teachers think he's a sweet kid; others think he
is easily distracted, occasionally disruptive, even disrespectful. He has
received a few suspensions for misbehavior, though none for bullying.

Judging by school records, at least one official seems to think Billy
contributes to the trouble that swirls around him. For example, Billy and
the boy who punched him at the bus stop had exchanged words and shoves a few
days earlier.

But Ms. Wolfe scoffs at the notion that her son causes or deserves the
beatings he receives. She wonders why Billy is the only one getting beaten
up, and why school officials are so reluctant to punish bullies and report
assaults to the police.

Mr. Wilbourn said federal law protected the privacy of students, so parents
of a bullied child should not assume that disciplinary action had not been
taken. He also said it was left to the discretion of staff members to
determine if an incident required police notification.

The Wolfes are not satisfied. This month they sued one of the bullies "and
other John Does," and are considering another lawsuit against the
Fayetteville School District. Their lawyer, D. Westbrook Doss Jr., said
there was neither glee nor much monetary reward in suing teenagers, but a
point had to be made: schoolchildren deserve to feel safe.

Billy Wolfe, for example, deserves to open his American history textbook and
not find anti-Billy sentiments scrawled across the pages. But there they
were, words so hurtful and foul.

The boy did what he could. "I'd put white-out on them," he says. "And if the
page didn't have stuff to learn, I'd rip it out."