FORSYTH COUNTY, Ga. – Two students now face charges in connection with racist Snapchat messages sent between middle school students.
Channel 2 investigative reporter Mark Winne got copies of the dozens of messages sent to students at Vickery Creek Middle School. Forsyth County Schools is investigating the messages and alleged comments a teacher made about them toward a student.
“When one of the students returned to school on Friday, we had a teacher that made a very inappropriate comment to her,” said Jennifer Caracciolo, a spokeswoman for Forsyth County Schools.
A mother said a teacher told her daughter to toughen up after she was targeted by the racist Snapchat conversation involving close to 40 kids, many of whom are her daughter’s fellow students. The teen told her teacher about the messages, thinking the teacher didn’t know the full story.
“I’m very uncomfortable here because they told me they were going to hang me,” her daughter reportedly told the teacher. “(She said,) ‘They told me they were going to hang my mother. They said they were going to whip me like a slave, to death, and they told me to kill myself.'”
“The teacher again responded with, ‘You know these boys aren’t going to hang you. You really should toughen up,'” the mother said.
A mother gave Channel 2 Action News a document on Forsyth County Schools letterhead that indicates the administration met with the Forsyth County Sheriff’s Office for nearly six hours to review more than 130 screenshots. The school said 11 students involved with the conversation are facing disciplinary actions.
Thomas Reynolds represents the mother and a second family with a 13-year-old son who was also targeted. The attorney said he counted at least 60 uses of the N-word in the messages.
“It’s something that every person should be appalled at,” Reynolds said. “It’s some of the worst language I’ve ever seen,” he said. “They’re talking about whipping people, hanging them in trees.”
Cpl. Doug Rainwater said the Forsyth County Sheriff’s Office jumped on the case quickly after the families reported the messages.
“We did charge two juveniles with terroristic threats,” Rainwater said.
The two students charged so far threatened bodily harm on Snapchat, and one used the word “shooting.”
“Once you use that word, we’re going to come to your house to make sure you have no means of actually doing something like that,” Rainwater said.
A mother who Winne spoke with said she has reported racism at the school several times before.
“We feel that we have responded appropriately; however if someone feels that we have not, we are always willing to listen,” Caracciolo said.
“We’re interested to see what they did previously that might have been able to prevent this,” Reynolds said.
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