Giving a bit more context it wasn’t just this one girl. This was a child porn trading ring with multiple victims, and they all had gone to the school administration and some even went to the police.

The principal, Danielle Coriell, said an investigation came up cold that day as no student took responsibility. The deputy assigned to the school searched social media for the images unsuccessfully, according to a recording of the disciplinary hearing.

“I was led to believe that this was just hearsay and rumors,” the girl’s father said, recounting a conversation he had that morning with the school counselor.

But the girl was miserable, and a police incident report showed more girls were reporting that they were victims, too. The 13-year-old returned to the counselor in the afternoon, asking to call her father. She said she was refused.

Her father says she sent a text message that said, “Dad,” and nothing else. They didn’t talk. With the mocking unrelenting, the girl texted her sister, “It’s not getting handled.”

And so she handled it herself.

Every moment she waited she was being further victimized, further harassed, and further threatened. Sexual harassment is considered sufficiently threatening behavior for self-defense to be justified, and that’s how the police are handling it.