A Perth woman claims her disabled daughter endured horrendous bullying that culminated in her being hung from a tree with a skipping rope.
Amber Yoon, 10, was born with a hole in her heart as well as a condition in which her oesophagus is disconnected from her stomach. She is almost completely deaf, and has been in and out of hospital throughout her young life.
Her mother Belinda says Amber had been bullied by other children at her school, Queen of Apostles Primary, for some time.
She wrote on Facebook that Amber was suffering from "psychological anxiety" as a result, and that she'd had several meetings with the school to discuss solutions.
The bullying allegedly came to a head last week in a horrifying incident that could have killed Amber.
Ms Yoon says that on August 24, the same girl who had bullied her daughter previously wrapped a skipping rope around Amber's neck and hung her by a tree on school property.
"Her toes [were] scraping the ground and she couldn't breathe," Ms Yoon wrote.
Thankfully a teacher saw Amber and ran to get her down. Her mother says the school didn't notify her about what had happened, instead leaving it to her tearful daughter to tell her once she got home.
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Ms Yoon also claims the school didn't seek medical attention for Amber, despite the marks left on her neck by the rope, and made her sit alone in the office for the rest of the day to write a statement.
She has withdrawn both Amber and her son Hunter from the school and is in the process of placing them in a different Catholic institution.
Ms Yoon says she's devastated by what her daughter, who has already been through so much, suffered at the hands of her young classmates.
"The fact that Amber is even able to walk is a miracle all on its own, and so to have kids be so nasty and with such a lack of empathy... I don't understand where we as a society have gone wrong, because this is starting to go beyond just your simple school yard bullying," she told Perth Now.
"We had bullying when I was a kid, but not like this."
Western Australia Police are investigating the alleged incident.
Newshub.
