EDINBURG, Texas — A school in South Texas is accused by a local attorney of trying to cover up a series of death threats made against a student. The attorney says officials went as far as calling law enforcement on the parent of the victim, who had gone to complain, and had the suspect students erase a video that they had allegedly recorded with the death threats. If proven true, the actions by school officials could be in violation of Texas law.
The incident began late last month when a parent picked up her daughter at Flores Zapata School in Edinburg, Texas, and found her in a state of shock after an episode of bullying followed by a series of death threats. Information provided exclusively to Breitbart Texas by the law firm of Octavia LaVon Martinez, which is representing the victim, revealed that while the victim’s mother was trying to report the issue to school officials, they called authorities on her. Officers with the Edinburg Consolidated School District Police Department spoke with the mother and then agreed to take a report on the matter.
The death threats followed a pattern of bullying by a group of three to four girls targeting the victim student. While some of the threats had been verbal in nature, the victim was also shown a video where one of the girls allegedly said that they would be killing her to create a better world.
Even after the initial case was reported to school officials and school principal Araceli de Los Santos claimed that she would personally handle the matter, the threats continued. The following day, the victim spoke to a teacher who revealed that a credible death threat had been made against the student, with claims of going to her home and killing her.
According to the information shared by the law firm with Breitbart Texas, De Los Santos and a school counselor spoke with the victim and told her that they were going to speak with the other girls and had told them to erase any videos with the threats. De Los Santos then spoke on the phone with the victim’s mother, claiming that the issue had been handled, “necessary measures” had been taken, and that they could not share additional information. The students behind the threats have not been suspended nor received any disciplinary action other than being moved to another classroom.
According to LaVon Martinez, the actions taken by the school are in violation of not only school policy but also David’s Law, which was enacted in Texas in 2017 following the suicide of 16-year-old David Molak, who was the victim of cyber-bullying. The attorney revealed to Breitbart Texas that by ordering the deletion of the video threats, school officials could have been trying to destroy evidence in a criminal investigation. The attorney revealed that the victim has been severely impacted and traumatized by the threats.
Breitbart Texas has contacted the Edinburg CISD and filed a Freedom of Information request asking for the initial police reports on the case, as well as the response from the school to the death threats. School officials responded that they had turned the request for information over to the school’s attorney pending a response.
Schools in the cities along the Texas border have a long history of controversies involving political corruption, mismanagement, and abuse.
Last year, the parents of some students sued Edinburg CISD and some of the coaching staff at a high school after they allegedly forced the students out of the showers and forced them to do calisthenics in the nude, the local CBS affiliate Valleycentral.com reported.
In 2024, two ECISD school board members were censured for promoting political candidates and for receiving gifts while in an official capacity, according to the local ABC affiliate KRGV.com.
In 2019, a former school board member in the nearby Rio Grande City ISD faced a federal indictment in a $38 million bribery scandal involving a city water treatment plant. At the same time, lawsuits filed involving that school board pointed to political retaliation by school and government officials against those who opposed them, Texas Scorecard reported at the time.
In 2015, Breitbart Texas conducted an in-depth investigation into Donna ISD, where the school board at the time engaged in several corrupt actions. Some of the cases reported by Breitbart Texas included the hiring of a school attorney who had previously been convicted of money laundering in a cartel-connected case. That attorney was charging a base salary three times higher than the previous law firm, as well as an additional hourly rate that made him one of the highest-paid school attorneys in the state. At the time, Donna ISD was also involved in political retaliation, going so far as to have its school police target rivals for criminal investigations. In 2015, federal authorities arrested two school board members on bribery charges, a U.S. Attorney’s Office news release from the time revealed.
Ildefonso Ortiz is an award-winning journalist with Breitbart News Foundation. He co-founded Breitbart News Foundation’s Cartel Chronicles project with Brandon Darby and senior Breitbart management. You can follow him on Twitter and on Facebook. He can be contacted at [email protected].
Brandon Darby is the managing director and editor-in-chief of Breitbart Texas. He co-founded Breitbart News Foundation’s Cartel Chronicles project with Ildefonso Ortiz and senior Breitbart management. Follow him on Twitter and Facebook. He can be contacted at [email protected].
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