'Nine Boys Against One Girl': Father in Chelyabinsk Reports Schoolyard Beating

A conflict between elementary school students occurred on the grounds of School No. 21 in Chelyabinsk after classes. Several boys took a classmate«s belongings and then began beating her, the girl»s father, Raushan, told 74.RU. The family has filed a report with the police.

The children had the altercation on December 4, but the parents found out about it a day later, as their daughter did not immediately tell them what happened. Therefore, they did not go to a trauma center to document the injuries.

“My daughter was playing with her girlfriends and boy classmates near the school after classes. Her girlfriends left, and she was about to leave too, but the bullies took her backpack and started throwing it around,” the schoolgirl«s father Raushan said. “She was running in circles asking for her backpack back. They started pushing her, and then they started beating her outright. Someone hit her with the backpack, someone hit her on the head with a hand. Then they made her kneel, pulled off her hat, and kicked her.”

The parents asked their daughter why it started, but she couldn«t answer. At the same time, her father rules out an ethnic conflict—they are an ordinary Bashkir family. To understand what happened that day, the father contacted the school and asked to see the footage from the outdoor surveillance camera.

“I managed to watch part of the video; I counted nine boys against one girl there,” the father says. “When I asked if I could see the rest of the video, I was told: «Don»t you want too much.« Then the school administration went silent, and the homeroom teacher said: »Maybe you should change schools.«”

The parents do not intend to change their daughter«s school but want to identify all the offenders to have a further dialogue with their parents.

“We wrote in the parents« chat, but there was no reaction, so we turned to the police. We want them to watch the video frame by frame and establish who beat her,” Raushan explains his position.

Police told 74.RU that they are conducting an inspection. School No. 21 has also begun an internal investigation.

“The children were playing after classes and during the game pulled the girl«s hat off and threw it around; we saw that fact on the video, but we did not see a beating,” school principal Olga Ososkova commented to 74.RU. “In this situation, we do not have the right to provide the video; it»s personal data, only with the consent of all participants, there are many children there. Now we will gather all participants in the conflict—both parents and children—to clarify the circumstances of what happened.”