A group of Staten Island parents staged an unprecedented protest against an 8-year-old boy in a gifted and talented class who they say stabbed an educator with a pencil and terrorizes classmates.
The hellion at highly-rated PS 8 in Great Kills threatened to bring in a gun; points his little hand as if it were a pistol and imitates shooting his peers; growls, screams, throws chairs and kicks kids during class, frightened third-graders told their parents.
“He was saying he was going to shoot and kill [students and staffers], bury them, the FBI wouldn’t be able to find them,” one mother said.
In another incident, the child hit a female classmate and told her, “Shut up,” a second mom said. The girl kicked the boy in response and reported the episode to the teacher. Then things took a chilling turn.
“‘When I come to school tomorrow, I’m going to bring a gun and shoot everybody in this class. And I’m going to bury you 10,000 feet below the ground,’ ” the boy told the girl, according to her mom.
At least one child transferred out of the class because of the boy, who is the son of a fired city public school guidance counselor.
“There was an incident with the child saying dangerous and harmful things about the teacher and what he wanted to do to her, so I felt uncomfortable and said, ‘I don’t think this is a good place for my child,’” the third mom told The Post.
“He would speak about violence against the children, violence against the teacher. That’s not something a kid their age should be thinking about. It’s disturbing.”
On April 25 the parents took the extraordinary step of staging a “boycott” — keeping 21 of the class’ 31 kids out of school — and rallied with fliers outside the Lindenwood Road school to press the DOE to expel the alleged menace.
“True threat of DEADLY VIOLENCE at PS8,” the flier read. “We need the Superintendent to step in with a solution before anyone else gets hurt.”
The children, most of whom have been together since kindergarten at the school, which is ranked 48th out 1,064 NYC elementary schools by US News and World Report, described their distress and anxiety in heartbreaking letters the parents provided to The Post.
“His behavior makes me feel unsafe, worried, terrified and on edge every day when I go to school,” one wrote.
“I hate school ’cause of this,” another wrote.
“What if one day he actually hurts one of the students?” a third wrote.
“I’m scared he’s going to hurt my teachers or my friends or even me,” another child wrote.
The staffer who was allegedly stabbed with a pencil refused to comment. The police were not called, a source said.
Parents complained their pleas for help from Principal Lisa Esposito and District 31 Superintendent Roderick Palton have been ignored.
At a meeting in the fall, Palton promised to use “therapeutic crisis intervention” to “save” the troubled child, one mom said.
The child has not been suspended, but is frequently sent to a “meditation room” to play video games after he acts up, parents said.
But one expert said educators can take action.
“The system has to provide [the student] with an education but it doesn’t have to be at that school, and it certainly doesn’t have to be in that classroom,” said David Bloomfield, a professor of education law at Brooklyn College and CUNY graduate center, explaining that DOE policy allows administrators to remove violent kids.
Administrators have also failed to keep the troubled child away from a boy he allegedly threatened on April 11, said that alleged victim’s mother.
“The school tells us that all children have rights . . . they cannot tell us what they are or are not doing,” she said.
“He has rights, and so does my child — if he’s threatening my child, as a parent, what am I supposed to do?”
The family filed a police report after the troubled child told their son “I’m going to rip you apart and kill you.”
Police took the report but told the family the child was too young for an order of protection, the victim’s mother said.
The alleged agitator’s mother, who did not respond to multiple messages seeking comment, was fired by the DOE in August 2016.
A student at the Staten Island middle school where she worked in December 2014 showed the guidance counselor a photo on his phone of a weapon, but she failed to alert the principal for a week, according to court records. She sued to regain her job, but the case was dismissed.
A man who said he knew the family insisted he knew nothing of the allegations against the boy, warning they could be “exaggerated” and there could be “legal ramifications” for The Post.
Interventions could help the boy without removing him from the class, said clinical psychologist Yamalis Diaz, an associate professor at NYU Langone’s Hassenfeld Children’s Hospital.
“There are many factors that would need to be assessed/considered before we determine level of risk and whether the child should be removed from the school,” said Diaz, who is not familiar with this specific case. “There are also many interventions that could be tried long before a child is removed from a school setting.”
Student safety is the DOE’s top priority, a spokesperson insisted.
“Make no mistake, this school is safe and is taking the appropriate steps to support every student. PS 8 school and district leaders are prepared to discuss any concerns with parents,” the spokesperson said.
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