Police move in on text bullies

Rampant text bullying in schools is forcing principals to bring in police to deal with the culprits.

Secondary schools have sent victims to police in an effort to deal with increasingly aggressive messages.

Schools told the Herald on Sunday police action was often the only way to identify perpetrators.

Auckland's McAuley High School sent a student to the police two weeks ago after she received abusive text messages. And in the school's latest newsletter, principal Anne Miles said the school would continue to include police in serious cases.

"It would depend on what was written, how hurtful it was or how the girl felt about it. You weigh everything up case by case," she said.

Whangarei Girls High School has also called in police to find, and deal with, students who send victimising text messages.

Principal Lyn Sneddon said the school had a campus cop who traced anonymous text messages and phoned the bullies with a serious warning.

"If you have a zero tolerance policy, [text bullying] doesn't have a chance to escalate," Ms Sneddon said.

With picture-cellphones and free weekend text messaging, cellphone bullying has increased dramatically with dire consequences. In February, Putaruru College student Alex Teka was found dead in her backyard after being the victim of a text bullying campaign.

And this month a student from one of Christchurch's top schools faced multiple sex charges after posing as a drug dealer in threatening text messages sent to a younger classmate.

Police manager of education services Owen Sanders said text bullying should only be reported to police if the text was serious or threatening.

"If the bullying is serious enough that it's causing a young person serious distress and disruption in their life, and it's a criminal assault, then I think the police should be talked to."

He said it was essential other options were worked through before calling on police resources. Police would avoid pressing charges against offenders and would try to refer the matter back to the school and families, Mr Sanders said.

Mrs Miles said there were limits on what schools could do as telecommunications companies wouldn't release private details unless it was a police matter.

Secondary Principals Association president Graham Young said it was often impossible for schools to track the origin of texts and the only way forward was to talk to police.

Internet safety watchdog Netsafe said there had been a significant increase in reports of text bullying by students and parents since the death of Alex Teka was made public.

"The whole thing has been bitterly tragic but I think there's a new public awareness and parents are taking it more seriously.

"And the kids are thinking, 'gosh I should report this'. I think their alert system is picking up," said spokeswoman Claire Balfour.

Last year Netsafe referred 250 complaints to the police - a third of all grievances.

The Ministry of Education said bullying matters were left up to individual schools, and would not comment on whether McAuley High's actions were appropriate.

Mrs Miles said the problem had been exacerbated by companies offering free text messaging at weekends.