A family is horrified after the monument dedicated to their late daughter was removed for her school days after being erected.
Year 7 student Charlotte O’Brien took her own life in September after experiencing relentless bullying while attending St Sabina’s Catholic School, in Strathfield, in Sydney’s inner west.
Following the tragic death of the 12-year-old girl, her heartbroken family installed a memorial in a tree near the girls’ school.
Charlotte’s aunt, Melinda Rodgers, explained that it was the only way they could say goodbye to the young woman.
“It was something we wanted to do for Charlotte because we didn’t get a chance to say goodbye,” he told 9News.
“It was our special way of giving him something to tell him that you mattered and that we missed you.”
The memorial was installed on a tree over the weekend, with a small plaque and flowers to pay tribute to Charlotte.
When the family passed by the memorial the next morning, the site had grown in size and others left their own flowers to pay tribute to the 12-year-old boy.
The seventh-grade student tragically committed suicide in September
Charlotte’s grandfather, Bill, photographed at the memorial site.
However, on Monday afternoon, the entire monument was removed.
The family first realized this when they discovered Charlotte’s grandfather “wandering aimlessly up and down the street…trying to find the memorial place to lay his flowers.”
After leaving the flowers at the site of the original memorial, they were “devastated” to learn they had also been removed.
“Words cannot express how devastated we were,” Mrs Rodger said.
Paulina Skerman, headteacher of Santa Sabina, confirmed that they had removed the monument “due to concerns raised about the impact this could have on young people”.
He explained that the school was “with Charlotte’s family to find a permanent and loving way to remember Charlotte” and promised that the 12-year-old “would not be forgotten.”
Despite this reasoning from the school, Charlotte’s father, Mat, said he was “running out of words” to describe his feelings about the situation.
“From the school’s perspective, if they had advised me to take those things off, I wouldn’t have touched them,” he told 9News, adding that it would be a “positive step” for the school to erect a permanent memorial to his daughter.