Greenbrier County dad says school officials didn’t notify him of daughter’s suicide attempt

GREENBRIER COUNTY, WV (WVNS) — A father in Greenbrier County said Greenbrier West High School administrators did not notify him when his teenaged daughter attempted suicide earlier in the academic year.

Charlie Regalado said his daughter, Sonja Regalado-Smith, was 13 when she entered the high school, due to her knowledge base. He said she initially made good grades and new friends but that other students later began a campaign of pervasive abuse towards her, which progressed from calling her names to physical abuse.

Sonja said teachers at the school tried to resolve the problem, with one of her teachers eventually having an anxiety attack in her classroom because the same group of students who were bullying Sonja constantly disrupted the class on a day the teacher was dealing with the death of a close friend.

“Teachers have mental health, too,” said Sonja, noting that the teacher had also tried to help her.

Once, Sonja said, her health teacher, a coach, caught one of his players bullying Sonja in the classroom and immediately disciplined all students involved. Things were better, for awhile, she said, but the campaign against her eventually continued.

Charlie Regalado said Sonja saw a therapist at the school. Greenbrier County Schools have an arrangement for mental health services through partnerships with Seneca Health and Rainelle Medical Center, Greenbrier County Schools officials said.

Charlie Regalado said he met with school principals and also with an assistant superintendent, who cautioned Regalado that privacy laws forbade him from learning the actions the school principal would take to address the abuse of his daughter.

He said the hostility towards her continued, and her grades plummeted.

“Then, it progressed to kids telling me to kill myself, and that’s when it got really bad,” said Sonja on Tuesday, March 26, 2024.

Sonja said she eventually made a suicide attempt and that her therapist at the school learned of it. She was initially ashamed to tell her dad, but confessed it to him after about six weeks, Charlie Regalado said.

Greenbrier County School assistant superintendents told 59News last week that school devices are monitored and that the central office receives alerts when words like “suicide” or “murder” are typed into school devices.

They said for situations related to suicide, a meeting is held with the student, their parents, the guidance counselor and mental health counselor.

Student support specialists are also brought in, school officials said, but the officials said they did not have immediate access to the number of such meetings which had been held in the school district.

“It varies,” said Greenbrier Schools Assistant Superintendent Doug Clemons. “It’s just really hard to put a number on.”

Charlie Regalado denied on Tuesday that Greenbrier West High School administrators notified him that his daughter had made a suicide attempt. He said he is haunted by the thought of how differently the situation could have ended, if Sonja’s depression had worsened and if he had remained unaware of how badly her mental state had deteriorated.

“Absolutely, he (the therapist) should have informed me, and I could’ve gotten Sonja the help that she needed, right then and there, because, at the time, the therapist she was seeing was the same therapist,” he said.

Sonja is now homeschooled, he added.

Charlie Regalado said students who bully others should be called in for mental health services, since bullying could be a sign of troubles at home.

He said public school teachers should have more leeway in disciplining students and gaining control of their classrooms and that school principals should have a progressive plan for addressing situations in which a student is being bullied.

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