An incident at Odessa High School is being considered a fight between two students and not an assault, so no charges are being pursued, Public Information Officer Mike Adkins said.
The incident, which occurred Wednesday at OHS, was investigated by the Ector County Independent School District Police Department.
The fight was videotaped and shows a student on the floor in distress, but no one helping her. Public Information Officer Mike Adkins said police have been investigating since Wednesday and they are still interviewing students.
Adkins said the girl who appears hurt may not have been jumped, but threatening messages may have been exchanged between her and another girl.
He said the video only showed the end of the fight and doesn’t give any indication of what happened in the hallway.
“You just see the end of it, so our principals and our police officers, their responsibility is they have to take that, but they have to figure out what happened before. That’s what they have been doing since yesterday,” Adkins said.
During the course of the investigation, authorities came across some information and evidence that this was “not an assault.”
“It was a fight,” he said. “Because of that, there won’t be any criminal charges being pursued it’s now up to the campus to handle it administratively. They’ll be working through the student code of conduct to figure out what the appropriate punishments are for the two girls that were involved.”
He said a student did run for help and that is not shown in the video. The student went to the nurse first, who called an assistant principal who called police officers.
“So they responded very quickly and made sure the girl was taken care of,” Adkins said.
“You do get the impression that kids were standing around watching it, but one had run for help right away so we’re proud of that, (and) glad that somebody would respond the right way by going to get help for that little girl,” he added.
PREVIOUS VERSION: Ector County Independent School District police are investigating a fight between two Odessa High School students that occurred Wednesday.
The fight was videotaped and it shows a student on the floor in distress and students walking over and around her but no one helping her. Public Information Officer Mike Adkins said police have been investigating since Wednesday and they are still interviewing students.
Adkins said the girl, who appears hurt, may not have been jumped, but threatening messages may have been exchanged between her and another girl.
He said he’s not sure what’s going to happen in terms of any charges.
Adkins said he talked to OHS Principal Mauricio Marquez and one thing the video doesn’t show is that a student ran to the nurse’s office and had an assistant principal and a police officer there quickly.
Keep checking back for more details.
