HOMESTEAD, Fla. – A Homestead charter school student facing criminal charges after police say he threatened to kill a classmate with a pair of scissors is back in school, much to the dismay of the accuser’s mother and other parents who say the teen has made threats before.
Ershia Godbolt has since pulled her children, including her 13-year-old son, Jaquan Wynter, from Somerset Oaks Academy.
Jaquan said in February, the teen “herd(ed)” him into a bathroom, “like he wanted to talk to me about something.”
Then, Jaquan said, “Basically, what he does is he looks at me and goes into his pocket and he pulls out a pair of scissors and he like puts it to my neck and he says ‘next time you spread rumors about me I going to F-in kill you.’”
The offender, according to an incident report, said he told the victim he would “stab his guts out” with scissors he pulled from a front pant pocket to threaten, “intimidate” and “scare” him into stopping spreading rumors about him.
The rumors in question? “A girl had told me that (the offender) had liked her and I had told my friend and it just bounced around like that,” Jaquan said.
Another student told investigators she “heard the offender speaking in class that he wanted to shoot the victim” and didn’t feel safe around him.
“(He) threatened to cut out my son’s tongue and was telling other students that he was going to shoot him,” Godbolt said.
Jaquan and the suspect had met in art class about a year prior.
“He always talked about he wanted to hurt people, it wasn’t just me, he would tell multiple people he talked to me about hurting and I just found that weird,” he said. “He would do that a lot, say that about other people, including his family too, he would say how he wanted to hurt his little sister for being annoying.”
Police arrested and charged the offending student with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, a third-degree felony.
Homestead police Capt. Fernando Morales told Local 10 News that “crimes against our children are not tolerated” and the Miami-Dade State Attorney’s Office said the case is open and set for trial next month.
However, the offender was permitted to return to school.
“I think it is insane, I think it is crazy,” Godbolt said. “I do think everyone has a right to an education but at what risk? At what risk do we have to separate the safety of our children and the education of our children?”
Godbolt said she feels the student should be at a mental health facility instead.
Another parent, who asked not to be identified, told Local 10 News that the suspect’s return to school has made people uncomfortable.
“He shouldn’t be allowed back,” that parent says.
A Florida Charter School Alliance spokesperson told Local 10 News that it is waiting for expulsion authorization from Miami-Dade County Public Schools.
In the meantime, the spokesperson said the offender is being escorted from class to class.
Godbolt called that “upsetting and discouraging.”
“The student still has to go to the restroom, the student still has to go to lunch, during dismissal, is someone always with this child?” she asked. “So that is my concern, although you are separating them, you can’t guarantee that someone will be with that child 24/7 throughout the school day.”
Godbolt said, “There are so many different scenarios that have happened here in Florida with children being harmed and faculty being harmed that better policies should be in place.”
An MDCPS spokesperson said in a statement that the district “is following appropriate laws and policy related to this matter.”