Teenage Girl Killed in School Bathroom Fight

21 Apr, 2016

Friends said Amy Inita Joyner-Francis went into the bathroom at Howard High School of Technology around 8 a.m. Thursday. About a half hour later, the 16-year-old was taken out on a stretcher and flown to A.I. duPont Hospital for Children, where she later died.

No one in the state can remember the last time a student was killed inside a Delaware school. Officials from the state Department of Homeland Security, Department of Education, Attorney General’s Office nor State Police keep that statistic.

Police have not released the cause of death for the New Castle girl or any details about what happened inside the restroom. Detectives from the homicide and violent crimes unit interviewed several students considered persons of interest and two female students were taken to police headquarters for further questioning, Wilmington police Chief Bobby Cummings said.

Hundreds of students, friends, neighbors and community activists attended a vigil outside the school Thursday night.

The crowd quietly reflected as prayers were recited; some in the group could be heard quietly sniffling. Toward the back, a ring of high school students looked on and talked quietly.

After the press conference, Cummings said he would not say what happened in the bathroom. He said there were no incidents that he knew of in the days leading up to the assault and Howard is not known as a violent school.

Last year, seven violent felonies were reported at the school, as well as 14 incidents of fighting or disorderly conduct, according to Department of Education. In the previous four years, only three violent felonies total were reported there.

School was just starting when the assault occurred and some students were already in class when the chaos broke out.

Attorney General Matt Denn said he mentors a student at Howard every week and was supposed to be at the school on Thursday morning. But he was in Dover for a bill signing with Gov. Jack Markell.

“I’ve dealt with the details of a couple of dozen homicides, and they’re all tragedies,” Denn said. “But the brutal beating death of a child, allegedly at the hands of another child, in a school is shocking even to those of us whose daily work involves dealing with the aftermath of violence.”

DelewareOnline.com

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