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Her girls are locked in bully 'hell'

Cheryl Joseph is desperate as she watches her daughter become more withdrawn - a downward spiral that sprang from being beaten and bullied at school.

Cheryl Joseph fights to have her daughter (not pictured) transferred
to a different school because she is being bullied. ( Mitchell Leff / staff photographer )
Cheryl Joseph fights to have her daughter (not pictured) transferred to a different school because she is being bullied. ( Mitchell Leff / staff photographer )Read more

CHERYL JOSEPH is desperate.

Every day, she watches her daughter Tiffany become more withdrawn. The 13-year-old locks herself in her room and often refuses to eat. She obsesses over her weight.

The smile that used to light up a room is gone. So is her shock of brown, bouncy curls, which she chopped off.

Worse yet, her mother said, she thinks that Tiffany, who has diabetes, tried to kill herself by taking too much insulin.

Tiffany's downward spiral sprang from being beaten, bullied and harassed by several classmates at Pepper Middle School, in Southwest Philadelphia - and by some of their parents - because a boy had picked Tiffany over another girl, her mother said.

The school district offered a glimmer of hope when it granted Tiffany and her sister, Gabrielle, 11, an emergency transfer.

The girls happily attended Shaw Middle School for four days. The district then shattered their newfound peace when it rescinded the transfer because of a problem with paperwork, ordering the girls back to the nightmare that they had escaped.

Now, Joseph faces jail time and a $500 fine because she's kept her kids out of Pepper Middle School for more than a month. She said she'd rather get locked up than send them back to that "hell hole."

"There's nothing else I can do as a parent, but keep them home with me," she said. "And I'm going to jail for that. I don't know how else to maintain my daughters' safety."

Joseph resubmitted the paperwork for a transfer on Tuesday. Yesterday, her request was again denied.

Enduring persistent abuse

The family's troubles began last school year when a boy rejected a girl because he liked Tiffany, Joseph said. The girl's friends and family, who live near Joseph's Southwest Philadelphia house, which is walking distance from Pepper, began pestering her.

Other students would bump Tiffany in the hallway. They made fun of her hair and called her fat. Gradually, the taunting spread, aimed at Gabrielle.

Joseph said that a woman who she believes is the mother of one of her daughter's bullies twice sneaked into Tiffany's school and threatened to beat her. A district spokesman said that the school had no knowledge of those incidents.

Summer brought a welcome break. Joseph kept her family out of the neighborhood, traveling to North Carolina and Cape May, and visiting relatives along the East Coast.

The new school year brought old problems. In September Tiffany came home with scraped knees because a classmate had shoved her from behind, knocking her to the ground. A couple of weeks later, several girls pummeled her with basketballs during gym class.

Even after school, the harassment continued.

Tiffany said that she was jumped twice by a group of girls at her school-bus stop, and that some woman rolled up in a car and threatened that she would shoot up her house.

At first, she reported each incident to her teacher, but she stopped doing so when the teacher did nothing, she said.

Last month, Joseph found Tiffany curled in her closet, shaking and almost unconscious after she had injected too much insulin. It could have been an accident, Joseph said. Or it could have been Tiffany making good on her threat to kill herself if she had to go back to school.

"I don't want to go back to school," Tiffany said. "I'm afraid they're going to mess with me. I can't go to sleep at night. I started throwing up. They kept making fun of my hair, so I just cut it off. I don't like myself like I used to."

Joseph and her husband, who does not want to be identified, had filed a police report in May, but nothing happened after the family of the girl who is jealous of Tiffany refused mediation, police said. Joseph said that she called the school several times in September and that after no one returned her calls, she went to the school to speak with the principal, Yolanda Armstrong.

Joseph said that an administrator told her that Armstrong was not available. She said that an assistant principal then told her that she had spoken with the gym teacher, who claimed that the incident with the basketballs had not occurred.

Calls to the school requesting comment from Armstrong were directed to the district's communication office. District spokesman Fernando Gallard said that Armstrong had no record of any incidents at the school.

In fact, Gallard said, the first time school officials heard of any allegations of bullying against Tiffany or her sister was after Oct. 25, when Joseph was served with truancy court paperwork.

Once notified of the claims, staffers investigated them but they were unfounded, he said. Joseph said that no one from the school has interviewed her daughter.

"The school is very proud with the actions they take when it comes to bullying," Gallard said.

Indeed, this week, Superintendent Arlene Ackerman and Mayor Nutter convened a panel on school safety that is charged with creating a safe environment for students in and out of school.

"Some of our young people are scared to come to school," Ackerman said Tuesday. "They're afraid of what will happen to them from the time they leave home until the time they get to school. I hope we can eliminate that fear."

Pepper, on 84th Street near Lindbergh Boulevard, is one of the district's "Focus 46" schools, at which most of the district's reported violent incidents occur.

Teased with a transfer

Joseph got relief on Oct. 28, when she met with Armstrong and an assistant principal, who agreed to transfer Tiffany and Gabrielle. Joseph filled out the necessary paperwork and waited for the official word.

Her children continued to attend Pepper until another assistant principal called her Nov. 1 to tell her that the transfers had gone through.

The girls were to attend Shaw Middle, at 54th Street near Warrington Avenue, and their sister Jocelyn, 8, who went to Patterson, would go to Comegys, at 51st Street near Greenway Avenue.

Ecstatic, Joseph bought the new uniforms, books and supplies. Almost immediately, she saw a difference in all her girls.

"At their new schools, the girls can't wait to do their homework, can't wait to learn," she said. "Overall, it's a better atmosphere of learning."

But four days later, Joseph got another phone call, this time from a district official telling her that the girls had to return to their old schools because the transfers were never approved.

Gallard said that the request hadn't gone through because Joseph had failed to go to district headquarters to complete the paperwork. He added that although Armstrong previously agreed to the transfers, she had disputed that the violence against Tiffany happened at the school.

On a pupil-transfer request form for all three children, dated Oct. 28 and signed by Armstrong, the principal wrote that it was "imperative that all three children are transferred."

Then letters dated Nov. 2 were sent to Joseph from the district's Office of Non-Instructional School Support, stating that the transfer had been denied due to a lack of documentation that any incident had occurred in or near school.

By Tuesday, when Joseph returned to Pepper to start the transfer process again, she said, Armstrong was singing a different tune.

On the new form, Armstrong wrote: "I strongly disagree with the statement above in reference to violence at Pepper Middle School. I do believe there may be violence in the neighborhood that the family lives in."

Last night, a district official left a message on Joseph's voice mail saying that the transfer was once again denied because the school did not provide any evidence to support her request.

But a Pepper employee with close knowledge of Tiffany's case confirmed yesterday that Tiffany and her sister Gabrielle are enrolled at Shaw. An administrator at Shaw also confirmed that the girls are enrolled there.

Gallard said that the girls are still Pepper students.

Jonathan Marshall, a truancy case manager, attended the meeting between Joseph and Pepper administrators last month. He was confused by the ordeal.

"It's kind of an iffy situation," he said. "They went through with the paperwork. I'm wondering what happened."

Meanwhile, Joseph waits. She is scheduled for a hearing before a truancy judge in January.

"Why is it so hard for them to give me the transfer?" she asked. "My girls don't want to be there anymore. I feel constantly on edge. For them to put us through this is horrible."