PALM COAST, Fla. — A 16-year-old student at Matanzas High School in Flagler County is being charged for biting a school staff member who was trying to break up a fight between her and another student.
According to a statement from the Flagler County Sheriff's Office, the school resource deputy was called about a fight between two girls in the school courtyard at around 1 p.m. on Friday, Oct. 6.
The staff member told the deputy that they tried to stop the fight and put their arm around one of the students. The student then bit the staff member's arm several times until she broke the skin, the sheriff's office said.
The student was arrested and charged with battery on a school official. She was taken to the Sheriff Perry Hall Inmate Detention Facility for processing and transferred to the Florida Department of Juvenile Justice.
It is not clear why the two students were fighting each other. In a statement, Flagler County Sheriff Rick Staly reminded students not to fight in school.
"It takes a bigger person to walk away from a fight and de-escalate the situation than to engage in a fight or attack a faculty member. Parents, talk and teach your students how to handle disagreements and that fighting is not the solution. This will help them for a lifetime," Staly said.
