Police should have been called on behalf of Grafner

This letter has not been edited

Mimi Ryun of Northglenn writes:

Published January 30, 2008 at 6 p.m.

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Today (1-16-08) there was another story in the Rocky on the plight of poor little Chandler Grafner. The assistant principal at his school, Maureen Hogan, stated that she called social services after she discovered injuries on the boy. Then she dropped the ball! Chandler TOLD her Jon Phillips had beaten him over and over which resulted in his ear being badly bruised, along with other marks, and also told her that Phillips told him he wasn’t allowed to talk to her about it anymore and would get in trouble if he did. Several of the school staff had seen bruises or marks of abuse on Chandler several times. There were many GLARING signs that he was being abused! That he told Ms. Graftner that he wasn’t afraid to go home because he was going to be “good” should not have mattered to anyone with common sense. But the most disturbing thing of all is that NOBODY ever called the POLICE! WHY? There are emergency procedures in place for children who are in immediate danger! BUT YOU NEED TO CALL THE POLICE TO PUT IT IN MOTION!

The school needs to discipline every person who suspected Chandler was being abused and did nothing and also amend it’s procedures for dealing with suspected child abuse. Social services needs to fire the people who kept passing the ball around while deciding which county had jurisdiction. That’s shameful! And in Chandler’s case, deadly!

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