Court rules bullying triggered schizophrenia

The Yomiuri Shimbun
May 25, 2007
Source: http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/national/20070525TDY03004.htm

The Hiroshima District Court on Thursday ruled that a high school boy's schizophrenia was partly due to his being bullied in middle school, and ordered four of his former classmates, the Hiroshima municipal and prefectural governments and others to pay about 8.3 million yen in compensation to the boy and his parents.

Presiding Judge Akio Nose said the bullying took place relentlessly over a long period, causing extreme mental stress and contributing to the boy's schizophrenia. The judge also ruled the school had failed in its supervisory capacity. The 19-year-old student and his parents filed the suit demanding the classmates, the city and prefectural governments and others pay compensation of about 26 million yen.

According to the ruling, the third-year high school student became a target of bullying from May 2001, when he was a second-year student at a municipal middle school in Hiroshima. The four classmates threw rocks at him, and when he became a third-year student, they hid his textbooks and other school materials and forced him to shoplift.

The student began refusing to go to school from June 2002 and suffered hallucinations, leading a doctor to diagnose schizophrenia.

The judge insisted that bullying could seriously damage a person's pride, linking the harassment with the psychological disorder. Noting that the bullying had taken place continuously in hallways in front of classrooms and outside faculty rooms where teachers should have recognized the situation, the judge said, "[The faculty] didn't carefully observe whether the students were just playing or someone was being bullied, and basically let them do as they pleased."

(May. 25, 2007)