KUMAMOTO (TR) – A third-party committee organized by the Kumamoto City Board of Education revealed this week that a female student at a Kumamoto City middle school bullied three female classmates by utilizing more than 100 fictitious characters on social networking sites and demanding money.
On May 13, the third-party committee submitted a report to Hiromichi Endo, Kumamoto City’s Superintendent of Education, reports Fuji News Network (May 14).
Based on the findings in the report, the incident began in August 2020, when the girl was in the sixth grade. Through September 2023, she impersonated more than 100 people online with fictitious social media accounts.
After making the victims believe that they would be harmed, she demanded money from them, collecting a total of about 180,000 yen.
The parents of two of the victims complained that their children had suffered mental distress and that this was a case of bullying. The school later determined that this was a “serious bullying incident.” The board of education then set up the third-party committee.
“Anxious and threatening”
At a press conference, Ryuta Kuroyama, the chairman of the committee, said, “It is believed that the perpetrator mind-controlled the victims on multiple social media sites and psychologically dominated them.”
Initially, it was thought that there were two victims, but during the investigation, another victim was added, bringing the total to three.
The third-party committee pointed out that the support system was insufficient. This included the principal’s delay in determining that the case was a “serious bullying incident.” The committee also found fault the board of education’s initial decision that “the school can handle it.”
In response to the submission of the report, superintendent Endo commented, “We will carefully examine the report and consider what appropriate responses the school and the board of education should have made, and we would like to prevent a recurrence.”
