Boy on KIPP Morial bus punched repeatedly; mother seeks police action

A video showing a young boy being punched repeatedly by a larger classmate spread across social media on Tuesday. The clip, which captured the assault on a school bus, drew approximately 40,000 views in just 20 minutes before the poster removed it at the request of the victim's mother.

Dionne Conerly, 33, first learned of the attack through the viral footage. She discovered that the incident had occurred on Oct. 30, nearly a week before the video surfaced. Her son, Karmelo McCoi, a fifth-grader at KIPP Morial in New Orleans East, told his mother on Wednesday that he had reported the bullying to a teacher that same morning. The teacher issued a verbal warning to the older student, whom Conerly believes is in seventh or eighth grade.

The verbal warning appeared to escalate the situation. Conerly's daughter, who also rides the bus, told her mother that the two students began exchanging words before the bus departed from the school that afternoon. The older boy then physically attacked Karmelo. Conerly said the older student waited until the evening ride to retaliate for the teacher's warning. 'He waited till that evening when they got on the bus and he beat my child up,' Conerly said.

The bus driver alerted a school dean, who boarded to investigate but did not remove either student from the vehicle. Conerly spoke with KIPP Morial officials on Wednesday morning, questioning why the school did not separate the children immediately after the driver's report. The school staff told her the fight did not seem like a big deal. 'But as you see from the video, it is a big deal,' Conerly said.

The school offered a four-day suspension for the older student as the sole remedy. Conerly noted that the suspended child did not attend school on Wednesday, likely due to the circulating video. Under New Orleans Public Schools guidelines, a suspended student cannot return to school until after a parent-teacher conference is held. Some schools also ban students from buses for a set period following such incidents.

Hammond's Transportation, the company that provides buses for KIPP New Orleans, gave Conerly conflicting information. The company owner told her that both children had been removed from the bus and that the incident had happened more than a month prior. Neither KIPP New Orleans nor Hammond's Transportation responded immediately to requests for comment.

Karmelo feels humiliated and does not want to return to school. Conerly is considering filing a report with the New Orleans Police Department and wants to see the other student face charges. She worries the bullying will continue as the video circulates. 'Just imagine if my child would have gotten injured, came home and committed suicide or went to sleep and never woke up, we wouldn't have known anything until today,' Conerly said.