Citywide efforts are underway to identify the Bullard High student or students who pelted a girl with juice boxes while shouting gay slurs at the school earlier this week, including a cash reward.
Logann Pruneda says she was hit with full boxes of apple juice at school on Monday and was called “a faggot, a queer and a lesbo” during the attack. Monday was her 16th birthday.
The Fresno Unified sophomore, who has been openly gay since middle school, took pictures of abrasions on her neck and back that she says are from the incident.
The school has no surveillance cameras in the outdoor area of the campus where the incident happened during a fire drill, and no students had come forward as witnesses or suspects as of Wednesday.
Fresno Police spokesman Mark Hudson said Wednesday that police are seeking information from students and hope to make progress on the case soon.
“It’s an assault that can also be investigated as a hate crime based upon sexual orientation as a substantial motivating factor,” Hudson said. “Once we are able to obviously speak to a person who’s willing to talk to us, who committed the crime, then we’ll have more evidence to try and move a case forward. We’re asking for students’ help in identifying who assaulted her.”
Former Fresno County Supervisor Henry Perea, along with two other donors, is offering a $750 reward for any student who identifies the perpetrator. “I was just outraged,” Perea said. “We want to get this out as broadly as possible. I have a pretty good feeling we are going to catch these kids.”
Continue reading at The Fresno Bee.
