A Houston-area mother is grieving the loss of her 10-year-old son who she says committed suicide after months of constant tormenting at school.
"They wrote on his tablet to kill yourself, 'You don't belong here,'" Kevin Reese Jr.'s mother, Crystal, told ABC13.
A fifth-grader at Robinson Elementary School, Kevin hanged himself on January 21 after he and his 13-year-old sister returned from school. His sister found him in the closet of their family home.
"He hung himself in his closet. I told her to hang on with me, if you cut him down and while you're cutting him down, call 911," Crystal recalled.
She describes her late son as a silly kid who enjoyed making others around him laugh. Kevin particularly enjoyed drawing and painting.
"Kevin was a goofy child," Crystal said. "He's my little goof troop, I called him."
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Crystal says things became physical in November when a classmate allegedly punched her son. Kevin felt helpless because he didn't engage with the aggressors.
"When it got physical back in November, he came home crying because he didn't fight back and one of the boys punched him several times coming from recess."
The New York Post reports Kevin had reached his limits.
"He just had enough," Crystal said. "He just had enough and he felt that he was backed into a corner."
Crystal says she contacted school officials, yet they took zero punitive action. A voicemail recovered from ABC13 confirms school administrators did investigate the November incident, but the other student in the altercation refuted claims of physical violence. The individual who left Crystal that message no longer works at Robinson Elementary and has been transferred to another role within the district.
The mother is channeling her grief into activism, using her son's story as a way to connect with parents about child suicide prevention, per the Post.
"Pay attention to your child," Crystal suggested. "Don't assume that things are handled at the school, stay on top of it until you see something come out on the end."
According to the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, suicide is the 10th leading cause of death in the country.
If you or anyone you know is in distress and considering suicide, contact the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8255.
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