DEARBORN — One sophomore girl from Fordson High School was celebrating what she described as a wonderful birthday with her family on the eve of February 10. But unbeknownst to her, she was about to receive a letter in the mail that would humiliate her and her entire family and turn her Happy Birthday into an ongoing grueling nightmare.

“My daughter was told to just drop it,” said one of the mothers of a girl who was a victim of the senior letter. “How can they expect us to just drop it? This has caused so much humiliation and stress on my daughter. It’s not fair that she is a victim and nothing continues to be done.”

The content of this letter was considerably inappropriate, using fowl language that would falsely accuse and describe the girls engaging in sexual exploits with other guys in the school.  The letter doesn’t stop there; families are also mentioned, even going as far as calling one parent a pedophile. 

The snowball effect and awareness of the letter continued. Within a day copies of the letter had found their way on Facebook, Twitter and even BlackBerry Messenger. 

What’s even more surprising is that this letter was not the first of its kind. Three weeks earlier, a similar letter distributed in the same fashion had targeted senior girls at the school. That letter had also caused uproar, eventually involving the Dearborn police. 

But according to the parents and family members, instead of the Fordson Administration taking proper action by punishing those who were suspected of composing the senior letter, it was swept under the rug. 

“My daughter was told to just drop it,” said one of the mothers of a girl who was a victim of the senior letter. “How can they expect us to just drop it? This has caused so much humiliation and stress on my daughter. It’s not fair that she is a victim and nothing continues to be done.”

According to the daughter, a text was accidentally sent to her by one of the two guys responsible for the senior letter. The content of the text proved these two guys were guilty of writing the letter. However, after she and a few of the other girls whose names were in the letter had taken the evidence to the principal, Mr. Mosallam, he said he could do nothing about it legally.  

The mother says she and her husband had been trying on numerous occasions to get in contact with Mr. Mosallam to seek proper punishment on the two guys responsible for the senior letter. But instead, she says they kept stalling on making any sort of decisions and hoped it would just die down.

“I spoke with several parents who had contacted me,” Mr. Mosallam stated. “I even met with parents one on one and contacted them personally. But i will say i was not in the building when one of these events had occured.”

Confrontations and fights would eventually break out between families on and off school property. The senior girls claim that the two guys responsible for the first letter were even mocking them afterwards, because they had gotten away with it. 

An older brother of one of the girl’s whose name was included in the sophomore letter says he also got the same response from the administrators when he immediately went to the school on a Monday morning to discuss matters with the Assistant Principal, Mr. Gurke. Over that weekend, his sister had learned the name of the suspect who had written and distributed the second letter.

“I just graduated from Fordson a few years ago and this would’ve never happened while I was there,” said the brother. “We have to make an example out of the kid that did this so this doesn’t happen again.”

But the Assistant Principal disagreed, acording to the Brother. Even after the suspect of the sophomore letter had been called down and willingly admitted to having been responsible, his only punishment was being sent home for the day. The concerned parents and family members were told to be patient, in a similar manner to what had happened with the first letter.

“Had they handled the first letter correctly and taken the proper action, there never would’ve been a second letter.” said the mother of the senior girl. “But the administration wants to make it seem like there is no bulling problem going on at Fordson under their watch.”

While serving his one day of out of school suspension, the guy who composed the sophomore letter was pressured into issuing a public apology on Facebook by some of the family members.  He and his parents even made their rounds to a couple of the girls’ homes to apologize in person. 

But other parents feel that isn’t enough.

“He needs to be expelled,” said another mother. “This took a big toll on my daughter. It was unfair to her. If they let this go, it’s just going to happen again,” she added.  “But if they take proper action and expel him, then other kids will realize the severity of something like this.” 

Some of the family members even went to the Dearborn Police, who were made aware of both letters on different occasions but said there was no sufficient evidence to prove that the suspects were responsible for it. Furthermore, family members of the suspects had also been defending them, claiming they wouldn’t do such a thing. 

Some families have been so humiliated by the letters that they’ve decided to not come out and speak against the suspects in fear that the letters were going to further spread around.

“These are their daughters that are being publicly humiliated,” said one father. “But we feel that we need to make this a bigger issue so the right actions are taken and it doesn’t happen again.”

That may be too late. In the last two weeks, copycat letters have already surfaced at nearby schools targeting their own students. Dearborn High, located in west Dearborn and Crestwood High in Dearborn Heights now have similar cases on their hands.  

According to Mr. Mosallam, the school has already taken pro-active mesures in response to the letters.

An emergency meeting had taken place on one particular day after school where 30 students were invited, including some of the girls from the letters. At the meeting, an “End it, don’t send it” anti-bullying campaign was put in place by the Student Advisory Group which consists of student leaders. An anti bullying video was also created by some students.

“The best way to prevent bullying is to get our students to stand up,” Mr. Mosallam added.

As a further initative, he is in the process of setting up a meeting for early next week in an effort to get the community on the same page and discuss how they can create more proactive measures to put a stop to the bullying. Both community and religious leaders have been invited. The event will take place at Fordson on Tuesday, February 28 at 5:00 p.m. He has also extended the invitations to the parents of the victims.