SAITAMA (TR) – Tatsunosuke Komatsuda, who was repeatedly bullied while a middle school student in Kawaguchi City, was left with a severe leg injury after a suicide attempt, his third, in 2017.
On Sunday, the 15-year-old died in a fatal plunge from an apartment building. The city’s board of education revealed on Monday that it is seeking to confirm whether his death was in fact the result of a suicide, reports the Sankei Shimbun (Sept. 9).
According to the Kawaguchi City Board of Education, Komatsuda entered the middle school in April, 2016. The following month, he began being bullied by elder students and members of the soccer team.
On two occasions in September and October of that year, Komatsuda attempted suicide by hanging at his residence. The following April, he leaped from a building near his residence, causing fractures to his skull.
Prior to the three attempts to take his life, Komatsuda wrote a letter to a teacher in which he sought “help.” However, the teacher dismissed the request, the board said in a previous announcement last year.
Bullying recognized
After the third suicide attempt, Komatsuda stopped attending class. Then school then acknowledged that he was being bullied.
In November, the board of education commissioned a third-party investigation to determine whether the boy was bullied. It was later suspended after he did not provide reasonable responses to queries.
In February of last year, Komatsuda returned to school in a wheelchair, the result of injuries sustained in the third suicide attempt. Several months later, the investigation was resumed after he became cooperative.
After the investigation was concluded, the results were not provided to the family.
“The bullying while [he] was a middle school student and the lies of the board of education are something that I cannot get out of my head,” a relative of the boy told the Tokyo Shimbun. “It is regrettable.”
Staying at his grandparents
On Saturday, Komatsuda, who graduated from the school this past March, was staying at the apartment of his grandparents in Kawaguchi, the family told the Tokyo Shimbun.
That night, he went missing. At around 1:00 a.m. the following morning, he was found collapsed on the premises of the apartment building. He was later confirmed dead. He is believed to have jumped to his death from the top floor of the building.
His mother later found a note in his room at their residence. “The board of education are liars,” it read. “They protected the bullies. So, from now, it is goodbye.”
