A small crowd gathered at a motorcycle rally in Surrey Sunday morning to show support for a teenage girl who was brutally beaten and bullied earlier this month.
It’s the second rally the family has put together since the horrific incident and now, they’re seeking justice and pushing for tougher sentences for young offenders.
“She can’t live a normal life. She can’t walk down the street. She can’t go to the mall with her friends,” said the victim’s mother — whose identity is protected by the Youth Criminal Justice Act.
A video of the attack was posted online showing the victim getting punched and kicked by a group of teenage girls.
Weeks later, the wounds still feel fresh and the family says they’re struggling to cope.
“I’m a mess. Any parent that witnesses that or anything to do with their child, it mentally messes with us,” the victim’s mother said.
She added that her daughter is traumatized and doesn’t leave the house.
“She’s not going to school. She’s missing out on the last couple weeks of school because of it. Lots of doctor’s appointments because she’s got a lot of injuries that are not healing properly,” the mother said.
Jeff Rae of Bikers Against Bullying organized Sunday’s motorbike rally and said he watched the video of the incident in horror.
“It’s so easy to bully and be online and don’t understand what the consequences are,” he told CTV News.
“It takes the schools, it takes the parents, it takes friends, it takes groups like ours to make sure that this doesn’t continue on,” he added.
The victim’s parents plan on launching a petition next week, calling on changes to the education and judicial system, hoping for tougher laws against young offenders.
“They shouldn’t be allowed to go to school with other kids. Our kids should go to school being safe. Our kids should walk down the street being safe,” said the victim’s mother.
Rob Gordon, a criminology professor at Simon Fraser University, said while these parents might feel like there isn’t enough being done in this case, there are reasons why young people are treated the way they are by the criminal justice system
“I don’t know if there’s much evidence to show that harsher penalties involving conflicts between young people is going to be beneficial,” he said.
“The justice system, generally, is trying very hard not to prematurely label people in their young years because that leads to adverse consequences downstream,” he continued.
He explained that one way the system works to avoid incarcerating younger people is to use alternative solutions, including restorative justice, where the victim and offender can meet and discuss the impact of the harm.
In this case, several arrests have been made but police are limited in the details they can share because the Young Offenders Act places strict limits on what information can be revealed in cases where the perpetrators are not adults.