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Teacher who attacked student with a weight
BillieTheBot
Posts: 8,721 Bot
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1269833/Dumbbell-attack-teacher-Peter-Harvey-cleared-attempted-murder.html
As some of you know, the teacher was cleared of attempted murder but still convicted of GBH.
That's fair enough, he had a trial by jury and they found him innocent of a crime. What concerns me though are the comments people have left, that somehow it's ok to batter a 14 year old half to death with a dumbbell just because the lad was a troublemaker.
The story says he'd been told off 9 times in a year, as if to say it makes him a monster. I regularly sit on exclusion panels of children who have 10 times that number. 9 tellings off in a year is nothing.
Thats it really, just don't understand the mentality. There are other ways of dealing with unruly pupils, and the law even allows a teacher to use force to control a classroom. Just seems the bloke lost it and people are applauding him for it.
As some of you know, the teacher was cleared of attempted murder but still convicted of GBH.
That's fair enough, he had a trial by jury and they found him innocent of a crime. What concerns me though are the comments people have left, that somehow it's ok to batter a 14 year old half to death with a dumbbell just because the lad was a troublemaker.
The story says he'd been told off 9 times in a year, as if to say it makes him a monster. I regularly sit on exclusion panels of children who have 10 times that number. 9 tellings off in a year is nothing.
Thats it really, just don't understand the mentality. There are other ways of dealing with unruly pupils, and the law even allows a teacher to use force to control a classroom. Just seems the bloke lost it and people are applauding him for it.
Beep boop. I'm a bot.
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If that was a parent, at home, hitting their naughty kid with a dumbbell there is no way that people would be so light on them!
Xx
I notice there's not a great deal of condemnation for some of the disruptive little bastards that he was having to teach here. Quite telling, I reckon. Children need discipline.
Oh yes, and to the person who thought it was a good idea for him to "spend eight months on remand before the trial - despite his own mental state, his wife suffering severe depression and their daughter having Asperger's syndrome." - you're a cunt.
I dunno, I mean I'm not against a quick slap by parents on small children, but I think fracturing someone's skull with a dumbell whilst shouting 'die, die, die' is probably at the extreme end of corporal punishment.
That man should never have been allowed back into the classroom, but all of those children should be bloody ashamed of themselves.
The sentence that he got was fair and im glad he didnt go to prison, prison is about reforming (i think thats the word) the mind of law breaker, how can you reform someone who wasnt even sane at the time? He was obviously not healthy and it SHOULD have been picked up on earlier. I its the school/systems fault for missing this.
It's pretty much well known that kids can be cruel. They need a firm but level head to be dealt with really, not to be smashed to pieces by some poor soul who's lost the plot. That's just a very dangerous step in the wrong direction.
I'm afraid no one was in the right here.
What are you on about? The CPS guy should be sacked, the person who said that is a cunt? Hang on a minute. If the mentality is that they are little bastards then he should not have been teaching in the first place. Kids can be cruel, clever and manipulative - imagine dealing with adults in the real world then...you cannot justify this anyway whatsoever.
It is a mercy that the pupil survived, but it is interesting that so many of Harvey's former pupils have spoken up in his defense. Like LUB, I blame the school / system for creating the circumstances that lead to the attack.
Its because he was an extremely well liked teacher in the school - and from what my friends have said when they have been taught by him in the past - is that hes to kind and soft man, who kids took advantage of him because of these qualities. But I really sympathies with both parties, I hope people can learn from this terrible mistake and look into how schools deal with pupils and how they deal with teachers who come back from sick leave.
All of the above.
The fact that he was allowed back into the classroom in what was obviously very fragile mental health was a joke, and being tried for attempted murder was even more of a joke.
The kid he attacked in no way deserved what happened to him, but I do think he (and the others involved) should be ashamed of himself for driving another human being to such ends.
Sad story.
I have to teach PSHE/Citizenship as part of my job, you learn to deal with disruptive students in a way that doesn't involve smashing their skull in.
Yes, the kids should have behaved, I also think the LEA should have stepped in far sooner and retired him off. He was obviously in no fit state.
ah thats quite cool, you use to live in the mansfield(ish) area then?
aye lol
Long Eaton though, it's FTW
Xx
I actually think the LA / school / powers that be were also in the wrong as this teacher obviously went back to school too early, had no support and was just thrown in at the deep end. If you are off for a long period then you are eased back into the job, and that should be all positions, not just teaching.
It's not that bad tbh, but I'm kind of immune to it since I lived there most my life and still do on a part time basis. But it's not exactly the best place to live, it usually comes out as one of the worst places to live in the polls and stuff lol. In regards to the teacher, I went to another school not far away and witnessed quite a few teachers snap and have nervous breakdowns due to the kids being little shits and I heard worse stories from other schools. I'm not that surprised tbh. 2 teachers at my school actually died from heart attacks (one was a p.e teacher) while I was there too. I don't think I'd ever want to be a teacher.
small world! im living there now, and its an alright place, its just when you've lived there nearly 18 years of your life, you jsut want out at the next chance you have, thats why i cant wait for uni, 4 months to go :yippe:
yeah I can remember everyone feeling like that when we were leaving for uni....theres even a fb group 'mansfield's s*** lets get out of here!' It's not exactly somewhere you want to spend the rest of your life.
For something to be murder then the prosecution has to prove the mens rea or "guilty mind". If he was unstable, and was provoked enough, he could argue in court he lost utter control and lashed out - he still got done for GBH but it isnt argued that his intention was to actually kill the boy. That doesn't make it right what he did but he was convicted of GBH - it just says the prosecution failed to establish beyond reasonable doubt it was attempted murder.
Well, that means most murderers can be acquitted of murder then! A lot of murders are committed in the heat of the moment, and the majority of murderers are not in the right mind frame to be accused of anything!
Stupid law. :rolleyes:
Xx
I agree he was probably provoked a lot but a good teacher should know how to deal with those situations. I know how I would have dealt with it I would have said something like; "Look you are either here to learn or you can get out. If you wont learn then you can get out of school now".
I remember some of my teachers saying exactly that. And many disruptive pupils were expelled for constant bad behaviour.
But unfortunately today teachers no longer have power to clip bad behaved pupils round the ear or give them the cane. That is something that needs to be brought back. Corporal punishment was banned in schools because some schools abused it, but I think it still needs to be an option open to teachers in extreme cases.
Then that would just make it legal for him to smash the kid's skull in, no?
And there you have it. Older generations (and those at private schools) generally had (have?) a degree of respect for their teachers (backed up by parents' attitude) and fear for the likely consequences of their actions. From what I read about this incident, it was mob rule and the teacher wouldn't have stood a chance if he had tried to manhandle the lad out of class.
Edit: I just re-read this and it might look as if I am condoning the teacher's violent reaction. Just so we're clear, I'm not. Equally, beating this boy's head in with a gym weight has nothing to do with 'corporal punishment'. Smashing someone's skull is always going to be a criminal offense, whether or not corporal punishment is/was allowed in school.
were you caned?