Better technology not only allows our teens to communicate more with friends, but with enemies too. Cyber bullying is a big problem and its impacting one Loveland teen every day.
Claudia Muscott is now a freshman at the University of Northern Colorado, but has been dealing with the bullying on her Tumblr social media account since her senior year at Loveland High School.
The messages are too vulgar to print, but at times, tell Claudia to kill herself. One message saying, “It’s not cyber bullying if it’s true.”
“It made me feel awful about myself for a little bit because someone thought that about me," said Muscott. "It still makes me think of myself and it never puts a pretty image in your head."
Loveland High School looked into the claims and deferred to Loveland Police once their investigation started.
The Thompson School District released a statement on the issue to 7NEWS. It reads:
“District staff investigated the incident in question and also referred it to the Loveland Police Department. Thompson School District believes that all students are entitled to a safe and secure school environment, conducive to teaching and learning that is free from threat, harassment and any type of bullying behavior. The district has adopted specific policy and regulation language that recognizes the seriousness of bullying and outlines the steps that it follows when incidents of this type are reported.”
Loveland Police investigators tell 7NEWS, they’ve looked into the incident and have requested IP address information on the account from Tumblr. Police tell 7NEWS the information comes from a Denver area address, but police weren’t able to pin it down to a specific offender.
Muscott says her bully quit once she graduated high school in the spring of 2015, but started back up Labor Day weekend sending messages to Muscott’s newly formed Tumblr account.
"It's not appropriate for anyone to do this or for anyone to be treated like this, I wouldn't wish this upon anyone and if I ever met this person I would probably just ask them like why," said Muscott.
Now, Muscott wants other people going through this type of bullying to know that it will get better and the reliance on support from friends, family and loved ones is critical.
"It does get better, more than likely people will stand behind you, they'll support you, they'll love you through it," said Muscott.
