Head Teller's son

This the son of one of the tellers from a sister bank where my husband works. How can this happen, where were the school officials?

Can you post the article for those who can't access?

The parents of a West Chicago Middle School student are accusing school officials of mishandling an incident this week in which their 12-year-old son suffered serious injuries.

Isidro Velazquez has a brain bleed, a fractured sinus and several facial abrasions, said Kristine Cieslak, medical director of the pediatric emergency room at Central DuPage Hospital in Winfield, where the 7th grader was Thursday. He was moved to the standard pediatric unit later in the day.

"I don't know what happened, but it looked like he had been beaten up," Cieslak said. "Visually, he had been injured."

His parents allege their son was a victim of an assault on school grounds Tuesday after school was dismissed.



From his hospital bed Thursday, Isidro said a fellow student crept behind him while he was walking in the parking lot and placed him in a choke hold.

"I asked him to stop. I told him 'I tap out,' " he said, using a wrestling term. "But he didn't stop."

Isidro said the student, who he identified as a wrestler, choked him until he lost consciousness and fell face down on the concrete.

Moments later, a school nurse came to the boy's aid, telling him to walk to her office, Isidro said. When Salvador Velazquez called his son's cell phone, as he did each afternoon, a nurse answered and told him his son had an accident.

Velazquez and his wife, Rocio, rushed to the school to find their son bleeding from his face, screaming in pain and in need of medical care, Salvador Velazquez said.

"Why didn't the school call the ambulance for my son? Why didn't they call the police?" he said. "Why didn't the police do anything when I called them Tuesday? I think this is discrimination."

Velazquez called the police Tuesday before rushing his son to the hospital, he said.

"We also called the police after the parents expressed some concerns about whether the proper protocol was taken," said Cieslak, who initially treated Isidro when he arrived at the hospital. "The police confirmed a report had been made and assured me they were investigating."

But the parents say they were never given a report.

An investigator and the school police officer came to the hospital Wednesday to check on Isidro and to ask questions, said Rocio Velazquez. She said they apologized and gave her a police report number, but no report.

West Chicago Police Cmdr. Chris Shackelford said Thursday the police are conducting an "active investigation" and cannot give details.

"We are conducting an investigating and trying to reconstruct what happened," said Ed Leman, superintendent for the school district. "We are discussing what we can do to prevent this from happening again. We are very concerned that it did occur."

Leman said he could not share any further details.

As of Thursday, Isidro was stable and improving.

It's a shame.

Thanks Spooky for posting the full story, I posted and then went back to work. And I was so proud of myself for remembering how to insert a link to a website

His mom is a wonderful, gentle woman that is a friend of my hubby's and this is just so sad (and makes me very angry). She has not been at work all week but is due back next week so maybe he will know more. I just don't understand why no one called 911!!!

I cannot imagine how helpless they must have felt. Wow - just - wow.

Incredible on so many levels how no one at the school had common sense enough to call 911. Just wow.

And the parents didn't find out until they tried to call their son? How bad is that? What a nightmare for the family.

That's just wrong. I hope the little boy heals fully and quickly.

A similar thing happened to my brother-in laws step son at a school in Buffalo. He was apparently horsing around with another kid and was slammed to the ground, head first. The school didn't call ambulance, but called the father to cone get him becuase he was feeling ill. Step-dad took him stratight to hospital where they found bleeding in the brain. The hospital called the police to turn-in the school for not reporting the incident and not calling for medical help.

And that should have happened here too...it sounds like the ball was dropped everywhere you look.

I hope the kiddo is OK.

Corky, it's still probably too soon for a police report (article mentions that they were never given one). (I know it sometimes takes hubby a few days to finalize a report - he reviews those of the rookies - for grammer, spelling, etc. Kind of like an Audit report review process.) But tell them to keep asking for a copy.

I'm not getting discrimination or fault of the school from what's posted here.
The nurse found the boy 'moments later'.
The article states 'told him to walk' but there are no witnesses to say it was 'told' or 'asked if he could'. Just the language the reporter used.
If he could walk, why would she call 911? As a nurse, she's trained to assess injuries and know what to do. I live with a nurse so I'd trust another of the profession's judgement.
The kid was screaming and bleeding? He said it was a choke hold. Where'd the beating and blood come from? Was he screaming because the antiseptic stung when the nurse tried to clean him up?
As far as the hospital turning in the school, that's a big ol' CYA if I ever heard one. They want to make sure that no blame is laid at their door so they're pushing to make sure all injuries happened at the school. The kids a wrestler. What if he had something latently wrong already and the choke hold just pushed it over the top?

I'm sorry. We're talking about a kid here and we all know how kids tell things in their own way. Unless there's a slew of evidence to the contraty...which again this article does not present...let's at least give the nurse and the school the benefit of the doubt. Being related to teachers I can tell you, they're all too aware of what's on the line if kids aren't treated properly. I, for one, do not like the knee-jerk assumption that the nurse/school are in the wrong. Go find the kid who put the choke hold on and blame him.

TR - my take

blood = "choked him until he lost consciousness and fell face down on the concrete" head wounds bleed like CRAZY. Just seeing the face covered in blood would make any parent yell - "why didn't you send my kid to the hospital?!"

lost consciousness = hospital

In all my years lifeguarding that was a standard in first-aid procedure.

Kid says he passed out and fell face forward, right? No witnesses. He must have been conscious by the time the nurse got there or she couldn't have told him to walk to the office.

btw, I was a lifeguard too. I totally agree with calling a stretcher if you find someone unconscious. The story leads us to believe he wasn't unconscious for long...if he truly was at all.

Corky, when you read all of this, please remember, I don't doubt for a moment your assessment of the mother. Unfortunately, some of the most wonderful mothers in the world have less than perfect children and don't find out till something like this happens that their son is not their sweet little boy anymore. It's really hard to believe that something like this happened totally unprovoked. Both boys were wrestlers after all.

It doesn't matter what kind of kid he is or whether it was provoked, head injuries can be very serious (ask Liam Nieson's family) and the school should always err on the side of caution. An obvious head injury should be checked by a doctor. And the hospital reporting an incident like this to authorities is not CYA, it's the right thing to do.

I agree 100% with DSchrute.

I repeat, you cannot tell from the article quoted if this is what really happened or not. Remember, this is the MEDIA, those purveyors of all things sensational...and paper selling...talking. Don't get me wrong. I feel sorry for the kid. However, the other side of the story is not dunning the shool or the nurse.

This kind of stuff is why medical people are becoming more hesitant to help people outside of the absolute confines of their jobs. You do understand that this kind of sensationalistic media coverage can blow up to anything from increased mal practice insurance, just to settle out of court, to loosing her license and livelihood,right? If she deserves it, ok.

I'm just trying to put the brakes on the rush to find fault with the two entities that were not even involved in this. It was after school and the kid was headed home. Is your boss resposible if you get attacked in the parking lot???

I would think so. Liability falls on the property owner.

When my oldest was in the 5th grade, she was in an accident in PE class (caused by teacher, another story). I received a call saying I should come and get her, she probably should see a doctor. I was all the way across town (school was 1 mile from hospital). After breaking every speed limit to get there, I arrived to find her alone in the lunchroom on a cot with two broken arms and a goosegg the size of a softball on her forehead. I had to carry her to the car and take her to the hospital myself (although I probably should have called an ambulance at that moment, but I was totally enraged). No one assisted me at all.

The litigation ended in a financial settlement that helped pay for her college education. She's 35 now and I'm still angry about it.

This is an unfortunate reality. Example: a few years ago the rider ahead of me on cross-country had a nasty crash. She didn't get up. A friend who'd gone to the show with me and another spectator were EMTs, and they both sprinted out to the rider to check on her. Both flat refused to touch her (once they decided the worst injury was a broken leg) on the grounds that 1) neither were present in an official capacity, and 2) neither wanted to be held liable if something not obvious in field triage were also wrong. They both stood back and offered occasional pointers as to moving the fallen rider to a vehicle for transport to the ER (after the rider herself refused an ambulance), but that was it.

There is obviously more to this story, and perhaps the school/nurse/police/hospital are implicit in 'dropping the ball' - but I'm with TR in that this started out as a parking lot tussle between teenagers and those events are rarely reported accurately by either party. I know I never told the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth about any I was involved in or witness to, and neither did anyone else that I know.

What a borrible story...there would have been a 911 call if it was my son...but it would have been from me putting a good ol Texas a$$ whoppin on a school official for not taking care of my son properly...the injuries sound as though they are way above the expertise of a school nurse...

Thanks for the support, Becca. You've summarized my feelings quite succinctly.

btw, DQ, I wish I had the time to research this kind of liability. imho, blaming the owner of the parking lot if someone you knew came after you there would be a frivolous lawsuit. Where something happens is not a part of the real why behind it. If it had happened just outside the school fence, the kid would still be lying there.

The issue here to me isn't about liability, it's about 'responsible adults' who are paid to look after the welfare of our children, doing the right thing. If my child has a head injury, I don't care whose at fault. Call an ambulance and get him checked out. If you are so worried about liability, call 911. Doing nothing opens you up for more scrutiny. In my brother-in law's case, we didn't care that the kid that slammed his son was a trouble maker, we were pissed that the school let him lay in the nurses office, half unconscious, until his dad could get there to take him to the hospital.

I understand the anger you're talking about with your bil, DSchrute. But that's not what the paper says happened here. ACCORDING TO THE PAPER, this was a rapid fire series of events with the parents calling in the middle and rushing to the school. We don't know if the nurse told them to come or they just answered 'we'll be right there' as most of us parents would do.

Bottom line, it was after hours but the nurse still helped the kid. Even if you don't like how she suppossedly did it again ACCORDING TO A NEWSPAPER STORY. Has anyone said thank you at all or just 'you didn't do it right or do enough' or worse yet 'you discrimminated on how you helped him'.

I repeat, this kind of overreation is why more and more people just stand there and watch rather than try to help. So unless somehow we find out the truth, which as Becca pointed out above, is not likely, let's stop blaming. Let's just work to get the kid whole and healthy again.

First, I would say that I don't feel there was any kind of discrimination here and it angers me when that word is thrown around in situations like this.

However, I do believe that upon discovery of the injured student by the nurse that his parents should have been called immediately. At the very least, to ask them if they would authorize medical attention (whether given by the nurse herself or not), even though most schools do require a medical authorization at the beginning of each school year in the event of an illness or injury. Also, the boy had a cell phone and, at some point, did become conscious whereby the nurse could have even called the parents using his phone.

At the same time, it was a judgment call on her part. She did NOT ignore him or "turn a blind eye" when she encountered him. Had she even had the opportunity to get all of the details from the young man as to how his injuries even occurred? Maybe she had no idea that he had fallen face first and that was why he was bleeding. But she DID try to help him.

I don't know for sure if I would have called 911, but I would have to say an immediate call to the parents probably would have been in line.