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York police in South Carolina are investigating the brutal beating of a 12-year-old girl on a school bus last week.
Sixth-grader Ariana Magbanua said she had been bullied at school and that led to being beaten by another student on the way home from York Intermediate last week.
Video obtained by WCNC-TV shows a much larger girl viciously punching the 5-foot-2, 94-pound student in the head. Ariana said she was just trying to survive.
“I was just waiting for the bus driver to stop,” Ariana said. “I was just waiting for ’em to stop so she could get her off of me.”
Ariana’s mother, Susan, said the video is difficult to watch.
“I couldn’t watch it all the way through the first time,” she said. “I couldn’t watch it all the way through the second time.”
Magbanua said she counted that her daughter had been hit in the back of her head about 41 times in the first 90 seconds of the video.
“I couldn’t believe the viciousness,” Magbanua said. “I couldn’t believe the size difference. I couldn’t believe no one tried to jump in. No one tried to stop it. After you see what she did to Ari, I’m sure many of them did not want to step in.”
Ariana’s parents have asked the school and police for justice.
York District One Superintendent Vernon Prosser said the district plans to deal with the incident “swiftly and sternly….We will not tolerate violence in any way.”
Ariana’s best friend shot the video to document the bullying and beating. The friend has been punished for recording the attack, according to her father. Prosser said the school district doesn’t comment on student disciplinary actions.
But Magbanua said without the video she thinks the incident would have been swept under the rug.
Ariana said she was bruised and humiliated by the attack but she hopes what happened to her will be a lesson to others.
“I just hope people stop bullying. If there is somebody getting hurt, speak up.”
Staff writer Joe DePriest contributed.
