The father of a teenage schoolgirl who attempted to murder two teachers and a fellow pupil is reported by a newspaper to have defended her savage playground knife attack – reportedly claiming that her actions had ‘some merit’ following prolonged alleged bullying.
Aged 13, the Ysgol Dyffryn Aman (Amman Valley School) pupil used a multitool knife to stab assistant headteacher Fiona Elias, 48, and additional needs teacher Liz Hopkin, 53, before attacking another pupil on April 24 last year.
The teachers had confronted her for trying to access a hallway at the Carmarthenshire school – and she responded with unjustifiable violence, stabbing Ms Elias in the arm and Ms Hopkin in the neck.
But the ‘troubled’ and ‘unhappy’ girl, who cannot be named for legal reasons, was allegedly pushed to ‘breaking point’ after being bullied at school without any consequence for her tormentors, according to remarks reported to have been made by her father.
The father, who was raising the girl alone after her mother left home, was quoted in The Times as saying that his daughter was ‘responsible for her actions’ but added: ‘Unfortunately, her actions have some merit.’
He said: ‘When you have somebody of authority who is pushing down on you and they are not listening and you are getting constantly bullied, everyone is going to have a breaking point and she got to her breaking point, I believe.’
Swansea Crown Court heard that a fellow pupil had witnessed the girl being slapped on the back of the head four or five times by the year 10 pupil she went on to stab.
She had been kicked, punched and slapped by bullies at school up to four times a week, the trial heard, having moved from another school where she had also been bullied.
The moment before a schoolgirl (right, in black and white trainers) lunged at assistant headteacher Fiona Elias with a knife at Ysgol Dyffryn Aman in Carmarthenshire
The teenager was then restrained by Liz Hopkin (centre, in the patterned top) – but retrieved her knife and stabbed the additional needs teacher in the neck
Ysgol Dyffryn Aman, where the attack took place on April 24 last year.
The would-be killer felt she had been unfairly put in detention by Ms Elias, the court heard, and the girl told the court she spent her time feeling ‘quite anxious, scared, all the time… during school, after school, 24/7’.
The teacher had suspended her for a week at the start of the school year after finding a knife in her bag – which she had been bringing into school every day.
But the girl’s father said he had warned the school, after finding the knife, that ‘if you don’t stop the bullying, something is going to go bad’.
The girl had been allowed to return to school on the condition that her bag was checked every morning. But on the day of the attack, she left for school before her father woke up – and had taken to smuggling the blade in her trousers instead.
Her father added in further remarks reported by the newspaper: ‘At home, prior to it all happening, I could see she was getting depressed and she was self-harming. This was a sign.
‘She contemplated suicide for a little bit because the bullying was extreme, but instead of going that way about it, she went the other way and lashed out.’
The girl’s brother was arrested shortly after the attack after making threats involving a BB gun online. He was later released with no further action.
The attack on April 24 shocked the local community and Britain at large – prompting an immediate closure of the school campus and a temporary resumption of remote learning to enable police to carry out a full investigation.
CCTV from the school showed the girl sitting in an assembly hall driving the knife into the floor prior to the attack.
Footage played during the trial then showed the girl, with her hood up, speaking to Ms Elias in a corridor, in a row over the girl’s access to a hallway.
They then spoke outside in the playground – before the girl pulled out the knife and said: ‘I am going to f***ing kill you’.
Assistant headteacher Fiona Elias (left) was stabbed in the arm before additional needs teacher Liz Hopkin (right) stepped in to intervene and was stabbed in the neck
The schoolgirl then ran off after briefly being restrained – attacking another girl with whom she had previously had a ‘petty argument’
Ms Elias seen talking to the girl in a hallway in the school in the hours before the attack on April 24
As Ms Elias was stabbed, Ms Hopkin tried to restrain the girl, causing her to drop the knife – which she then retrieved, retaliating at Ms Hopkin by stabbing her in the neck.
A pair of male teachers tried to calm her down – but she ran off, with the knife still in hand, and stabbed the pupil, again telling her she was going to ‘f***ing kill you’ as she drove the knife into the girl’s chest and leg.
She was then wrenched off the girl and restrained by another teacher, Darrel Campbell, who helped detain her in a classroom before officers from Dyfed-Powys Police arrived and arrested her.
Prosecutors described the attack, which happened at around 11.15am, as a ‘serious episode of violence’.
Ms Elias had stab and puncture wounds to her arms and to a thumb, and the pupil had wounds to her back and lesser injuries to her legs.
Mrs Hopkin had stab wounds to her leg, a wound to the rear of the left side of the chest, and a stab wound at the top of the neck into the trapezius muscle.
All three alleged victims were taken to hospital for treatment – Ms Hopkin by air ambulance – and later released to recover at home.
The girl told the jury she did not like Ms Elias, and that she was ‘rude’ towards the authority figure, but never intended to harm her.
Police bodycam footage showed the girl making comments about ‘being a celebrity’ and having ‘more eyes on her’ after the attack.
But she told the trial: ‘I used to say stuff like ‘I hate her’, and never that I wanted her dead.’
There had been a ‘petty argument’ with the pupil she went on to attack months before – but this was thought to have been resolved.
The court heard the girl used to write and draw to express herself – but her notebooks were full of phrases like ‘crime of a lifetime’ and expressing a desire to do ‘something humans are not supposed to do’.
The fold-up multi-tool knife used by the schoolgirl to stab two teachers and a pupil. It had been concealed in her cargo trousers she wore instead of school uniform
The girl was captured on CCTV sitting in a school assembly hall driving the knife into the floor before the attack
The incident happened in the Amman Valley School, in Ammanford, Carmarthenshire
She had also referred to Ms Elias as ‘Frogface’ and wrote: ‘Why do I want to kill others as much as I want to kill myself?’
Prosecutor William Hughes had told jurors: ‘You may not think it’s uncommon for a teenager to write dark thoughts.
‘But it’s a world of difference, ladies and gentlemen, to carry out those thoughts and actually doing it.’
Caroline Rees KC, defending, asked the jurors to see the written material in the context of a ‘deeply unhappy’ teenage girl and to ‘reject what the prosecution say that they show an intent to kill.’
‘She wasn’t a child who really had people to turn to,’ Ms Rees said. ‘Instead, she tended to hide herself away, to isolate, and she drew.’
The girl claims she only realised the seriousness of what she had done when she was put in the back of a police van.
Asked how she felt about the attack looking back, she said: ‘It just doesn’t sound like me.
‘It’s kind of hard to forget, but also hard to remember. I suppose I’m sorry.’
The teen added her ‘heart felt like it was burning,’ when she saw one of the three being taken away on a stretcher.
She explained that she didn’t remember ‘much of that conversation’ in the police van where she said ‘oopsies’ and asked: ‘Are they dead?’.
The teen said she regretted the way she behaved that day, adding: ‘It was really out of character.’
Fiona Elias (left) later paid tribute to her colleague Liz Hopkin (right) for saving her life, telling her: ‘The word(s) thank you doesn’t seem enough’
Parents gathered anxiously outside Ysgol Dyffryn Aman on April 24 last year following the incident
The school was temporarily closed following the attack to allow a full investigation to take place (pictured: Police guarding the cordon)
All three victims were taken to hospital for treatment – Ms Hopkin by air ambulance after being stabbed in the neck (pictured: forensic police at the scene)
The girl, who cannot be named for legal reasons, previously pleaded guilty to three counts of wounding with intent and a further count of possession of a bladed article on a school premises but had denied attempted murder.
She was found guilty of attempted murder following the trial.
Sentencing will take place at a later date.
Following the trial, Ms Elias thanked Ms Hopkin for helping to save her life, telling reporters outside court: ‘Liz, the word(s) thank you doesn’t seem enough.’
In remarks reported by the BBC, she added: ‘No member of school staff should ever feel fearful for their own safety, merely for carrying out their own duties.
‘This verdict should be seen as a clear message for pupils across the country. I would not want any individual to go through the nightmare I have endured during the last nine months.’
A freedom of information request submitted by the broadcaster to Carmarthenshire Council revealed three teenage pupils brought knives to school in the two months after the Ysgol Dyffryn Aman incident.
Two involved multi-tools like those used in the attack.
Detective Chief Superintended Ross Evans of Dyfed-Powys Police said following the verdict: ‘School should be a safe place, a sanctuary for the pupils that attend it, and weapons have no place within their grounds.
‘We will not tolerate any attempt to compromise the safety of children or staff, and as demonstrated here we will act swiftly on the very rare occasion they are put at risk.
‘Now that criminal proceedings have come to an end, I ask that we let life at Dyffryn Aman get back to normal so the pupils and staff can focus on their education.’
Cllr Darren Price, leader of Carmarthenshire Council, said: ‘Violence, in any form, has unequivocally no place within our schools or any aspect of society.
‘On completion of the trial, all partners will be working together to review the circumstances of this case and to ensure we do all we can to prevent an incident of this nature happening again.’
