NOTTOWAY COUNTY, Va. -- A mother is calling for action after she said that her son was assaulted at a Nottoway County middle school.
"This was an assault. A sexual assault," said the mom, who asked not to be identified in order to protect her child. "My child has been continuously bullied, tortured, picked on, called names."
"What has happened here is absolutely disgraceful," John Roark, a member of the Nottoway Board of Supervisors District 2, said.
On Monday night, a Nottoway County Board of Supervisors member who was advocating for that child at the request of the mom addressed the school board.
"I want to tell the school board members that a male student was sexually assaulted with a broomstick at the middle school by another male student," Roark said.
Roark and the mother said that two school resource officers helped with the arrest.
"If it wasn't for them, this child may have received no justice," Roark said.
Roark's comment about the alleged assault wasn't the only thing he said at the meeting that surprised some school board members.
"The incident and conviction happened months ago," Roark said.
The mother said that the school has done nothing since the incident.
"The principal allowed the assailant to come back to school the very next day and sit beside the student who was sexually assaulted with the broomstick," Roark said.
The school system released the following statement regarding the alleged assault on Facebook:
We want our community to know that there was an investigation of the alleged incident in collaboration with the Nottoway County Sheriff's Office. This investigation followed our established process which aligns with school board policy.
"In that statement, the superintendent said that there was collaborative efforts since it was reported. That is a lie," Roark said.
School board member Clive Pettis confirmed that he posted a response online concerning Superintendent Tameshia Grimes and School Board Chairman Shelli Hinton.
"This is not what Gr. Grimes and Mrs. Hinton told the school board members in an executive session last night. I knew absolutely nothing about this until informed by John Roark that an assault had taken place months ago," Pettis said.
"I really feel like the board should have known from the beginning," the mother said.
While neither the school system, the sheriff's office or the Commonwealth's Attorney would confirm that a middle school student was arrested or convicted of assault, the Nottoway Sheriff's Office confirmed that an investigation was initiated and completed and that due process was followed.
However, the mother wants the school system to provide justice, as well as the courts' system.
"I would like a complete reform down at the school of policies and procedures for things like this. I keep trying to tell my son that he's being a hero."
The mother said that if anything good came out of Monday night's meeting, it's the support now being shown to her child.
