There was outrage and frustration from Novato as parents at Sinaloa Middle School learned new details a fight that led to several arrests.
Novato police announced eight arrests have been made in connection with the fight at Sinaloa Middle School. Children aged 12 to 14 were charged with conspiracy and assault.
Parents we spoke to say they have serious concerns about their children’s safety at school. They all asked us to hide their true identities.
Parents like Alicia have firsthand experience with confrontations at Sinaloa Middle School. She said her daughter has been bullied since the first day of school.
“It turned our family upside down,” Alicia said. “Absolutely upside down.”
The last incident was just a few weeks ago. Alicia is frustrated that the school has not taken further action to protect her daughter. So she was concerned about the way the school had handled another dispute last Thursday involving a separate group of students.
“They assured us it was being handled and the children involved were being reprimanded,” Alicia said.
But the next day, some of the same students involved in the fight on Thursday attacked the same victim.
“From the kids’ description, it was really scary,” Alicia said. “The description was that hundreds of children were running to see this fight.”
According to a spokesperson for the Novato Unified School District, the school was not aware of a possible fight on Friday and the issues of bullying among students were unknown to school staff prior to the incident.
Lisa said her own daughter was attacked by the same girl at the center of Friday’s fight and was angry that she had hurt another student.
“The school is aware that this girl has been involved in previous problems,” Lisa said. “It’s not the first time and there are no consequences. When the thing happened to my kid, she was only suspended for a day.”
Novato police said after a thorough investigation that this was more than just a fight, so arrests were made.
“The investigation revealed that this was not an isolated incident, but a planned incident and therefore this was unusual,” said Sgt. Alan Bates of the Novato Police Department.
Many parents have kept their children at home this week, concerned about their children’s safety. Now that what happened to Alicia’s daughter, keeping her child at home is something she thinks about every day.
“I sit in limbo every morning when I drop my child off at school and I’m afraid that this person is going to be there and she’s going to attack my daughter,” Alicia said.
