BATAVIA, Ohio — Parents of a 15-year-old girl confirmed that their daughter was one of two teenage girls seen on video repeatedly punching an 11-year-old in the head last Friday at West Clermont High School during a football game.
The video shared on social media also shows one girl appeared to kick the 11-year-old in the head as she sat on the ground.
The 15-year-old's parents said their daughter was the one who kicked the victim.
"She will accept responsibility for it," the 15-year-old's father said.
The 15-year-old's parents initially agreed to be identified by the I-Team in our first story reported on Tuesday. But they said they changed their mind, partly because of alleged threats against their daughter and the potential impact online stories could have on her later.
Based on that, the I-Team is not identifying the family in this story.
The victim's mother — Robin Kramer — said her daughter had exchanged messages with the 15-year-old weeks before the game.
"There was threats to beat up my daughter if they ever saw her," Kramer said. "I don't really know what started it. Just a bunch of back and forth saying just mean things to each other."
Cellphone video shared on social media shows Kramer's daughter and the 15-year-old exchanging words, appearing to shove each other and exchange punches within a few seconds while some students cheered them on.
Then, video shows another teenage girl — who Kramer said was 16 — rushing up to them and repeatedly punching the 11-year-old in the back of the head.
Video shows the 16-year-old girl flung Kramer's daughter to the ground.
Then, the video shows the two older girls getting on top of the child and repeatedly punching her in the head as she lay on her back.
"It was a very brutal and scary thing," Kramer said.
Kramer said her daughter wasn't seriously injured physically, but she shows signs of being traumatized mentally and emotionally since the attack.
The 11-year-old was attending her first high school football game with an older cousin, Kramer said.
Kramer said she didn't attend the game.
She said she learned about the attack when her daughter shared video of the incident and told her mom, "I was jumped."
West Clermont administrators learned about the incident "shortly after it happened and immediately contacted the Union Township Police Department," according to the district's statement.
"Several officers were already on-site at the event," WCSD spokesman Jeffrey Riel wrote in the statement. "Parents of both the West Clermont students and a student from another local school district that was involved in the altercation were contacted and the students were removed from the game."
According to the statement, the district will discipline two students.
A third student involved in the incident is from a different school district, according to the statement.
Riel said the WCSD will have more police officers and school administrators at future football games.
The 15-year-old's parents said school district administrators suspended their daughter for 10 days and recommended that she get expelled.
They said their daughter also faced expulsion for fighting during the previous school year, but instead of getting kicked out, the district allowed her to receive at-home instruction.
Her parents insisted that much of her recent problems are the result of being bullied online and in school.
"She was destroyed by severe bullying," her father said.
Her father admitted that his children were also harmed by his heroin addiction years ago.
The parents said they lost custody of their children twice, but regained custody and have worked together to stabilize their family.
The father said he's in a recovery program.
"We're still working through a lot," her father said. "I understand and I see how it looks. But even that being said, no one deserves to be treated and bullied, and tortured the way she has been."
The 15-year-old's parents admitted they should do more to monitor her social media activity and hold her accountable for her actions.
"I need to address it maybe more," the father said. "And be sure that the behavior is corrected and she knows how to act."
Union Township police declined to comment on the case because it's under investigation.
The Clermont County Prosecutor's Office did not respond to the I-Team's requests for comment.
