The father of a Minnesota transgender high school student who says she was beaten in school said Thursday he wants the students who beat or harassed his daughter to face criminal charges.
Mark Walztoni tells CNN his 17-year-old daughter Cobalt Sovereign, a junior at Hopkins High School in Minnetonka, was in the school bathroom last Thursday when a student started calling her transphobic slurs. While she was leaving the bathroom, Walztoni says his daughter said she was surrounded by that student and two others, who began following Sovereign down the hall, and when she turned around to ask them to stop, she was punched in the mouth.
During the attack, according to Walztoni, Sovereign’s jaw was broken in two places. She had a compound fracture and lost teeth, leading to reconstructive surgery. Walztoni says the students responsible should face criminal charges.
“There has to be repercussions for their actions. And if they are not charged for some reason, which is our fear, then that is just going to further escalate their behavior because when you get away with stuff, you continue to do stuff,” he said. “There needs to be some kind of punishment and there needs to be some serious discussion as to whether those kids should be able to come back to the same school.”
He also says he was notified about the incident from a social worker at the school and was told by school officials to notify the police, adding he was displeased the incident “wasn’t treated as an emergency.”
Walztoni also tells CNN he is unsure if his daughter will be safe going back to school and wants to see changes.
“It’s unacceptable. The whole transphobia and homophobia thing is, in my opinion, so 20th century, or it should be a thing of the past. And it’s clear that the climate is getting worse in this regard,” he told CNN’s Kaitlan Collins on “The Source.” “We have a tremendous amount of community support here and Cobalt feeling very loved but it’s you know it’s the kids that are there today aren’t safe.”