Bullied New Brunswick student gets full-time bodyguard

A 12-year-old New Brunswick boy, allegedly bullied because he was gay and overweight, now has a teacher's aide with him full-time.

CBC News reports the school district is paying for the attendant — essentially a bodyguard — for the Grade 7 student at L'École Samuel-de-Champlain in Saint John.

The boy, identified only as Dominic, had missed three months of school before going back in March. His parents told CBC he was targeted because he was flamboyantly different and over unfounded accusations of sexual touching.

They say the abuse was mostly verbal but Dominic was also punched, kicked, slapped and had handfuls of gravel thrown at him.

"They call me big, fat gay boy and when I'm walking by they say, 'Watch out, the ground is trembling,'" Dominic, who admits he's overweight, told CBC.

"It's just the truth in the end. But still, to be called fat in a mean way, hurts a lot."

The problem also has affected Dominic's sister, who their mother, Andree, said does not eat properly for fear of gaining weight and being targeted like her brother.

The school district opted to give Dominic a full-time attendant who it was hoped would guide him through stressful and threatening situations, the National Post reported.

But Andree, who initially wanted the escort, said her son's new minder has made him feel even more isolated and given his tormenters more ammunition.

"I don't really like it because I'm losing a lot of friends because she's there," Dominic told CBC, referring to the attendant.

"She has to know whatever anybody tells me or whatever I say. I can't keep anything from her."

Anti-bullying advocate Rob Frenette of Fredericton said he has never heard of a school district assigning a full-time monitor to someone being targeted.

"I think that's concerning on a couple fronts: one, how severe is this issue? And two, what other avenues has the school tried in order to address the problem?" asked Frenette, co-executive director of Bullying Canada.

Frenette told the Post he worked on a case in which a student was assigned an attendant escort him on the school bus, something he called an extreme measure taken only after cameras were installed and the bus driver was made aware of the problem.

Three years ago, the mother of a Fredericton teen hired a bodyguard for her daughter but the high school's principal barred the escort as a potential risk to other students.

Bullying researcher Wendy Craig said she's never heard of this approach.

"My guess is that the student needs support being reintegrated into the school classroom and that is not being accomplished with the attendant," she told the Post via email. "What is required is a relationship solution, a solution whereby the student is being supported in interacting with the other students."

Dominic's mother said the problem worsened last fall when three of his fellow students made allegations of inappropriate sexual touching.

Social workers investigated, Andree told CBC and the incidents were dismissed as "kid stuff." But Dominic was kept out of school for three months and tutored part-time, while those who made the allegations gloated about the damage they'd done.

"Had they brought him back within the first couple of weeks, it would have shown the students that what they were saying was hearsay and we're going to move on," she said.

"By making him be out for so long, it has allowed them to win. Now they have bragging rights."