A grieving father has lashed out at his son’s bullies on a Facebook video.
Last week Daniel Fitzpatrick’s son, also named Daniel, committed suicide in his family’s Staten Island home. The 13-year-old boy was found by one of his sisters hung by a belt in the family’s attic. A month before his death, young Daniel had written a heartbreaking letter detailing bullying he said he experienced at his Catholic elementary school due to his weight, innocent personality, and academic struggles. The teen also claimed that teachers and administrators all but ignored his pleas for help, with Daniel’s mom saying the school was sweeping the issue under the rug to “preserve their image.”
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In the Facebook video, Mr. Fitzpatrick spoke about the day his son was born, lamenting, “I laughed and cried the day that he was born at the same time, as crazy as it sounds, it’s true, and now I have to say goodbye to him out of this world. I won’t be laughing, I will be crying.”
The heartbroken father next reached out to parents of those who tormented his son, angrily saying, “I hope you never, never have to feel what my family is going through right now,” he said. “You get to hold your children every night and day for the rest of your lives and their natural lives. I don’t get that anymore. Your little monsters took that from me and my wife and his sisters.”
Courtesy NY Daily News
Fitzpatrick saved his most scathing remarks for those who bullied his son, and all bullies in general, proclaiming:
“I hope the memory of what you’ve done to my son is burning in your brain for the rest of your life and you suffer as much as he has suffered under your bullshit. [To all bullies,] you’re not cool. You’re disgusting. If I ever see any goddamn child in my life from now on, and I witness them and I see any kid getting bullied, doesn’t matter boy, girl, straight, bi, whatever. Transgender now. To the bully, I will knock you the f**k out. And how do you think it will make you feel?”
