Boy breaks grandmother's arm by accident

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I am not going to say what happened next and what I think until I have heard a few objective opinions on here

The facts of the case

12 year old boy in sports club, leaving the main entrance on his skateboard, which he has been told is not allowed in the building, knocks over the grandmother coming to collect another child. The grandmother has a broken arm and needed an operation

This is a fairly elite sports club, you need to be able to play to a certain standard to by allowed to join. This boy has played there for a year. No serious trouble, several minor reprimands. Reasonably good player. Turns up for the team probably 80-90% of the time.

This happened last weekend. The sports club is meeting tomorrow. The parents have just heard that this boy has/has not been expelled and will/will not be there.

What do you think should happen? why?

I am allocating the voting by a toss of a coin to be random!

YABU - the boy should be expelled
YANBU - the boy should not be expelled

also, what else should happen, as well as/ instead of being expelled?

Thank you

Depends on how he reacted after he did it, was he remorseful? Did he apologise? Was he upset after the incident?

A mistake is when you do something by accident. It wasn't a mistake, he thought the rules didn't apply to him or that he could get away with it. Unless someone comes down hard, he will continue.

I think you know very well that the poster was making the point that if it was an elderly lady who was the grandmother, then breaking a bone later in life can have a lot more serious consequences. There are a lot of older people admitted to hospital with broken bones because of falls etc, and end up succumbing to complications like sepsis and pneumonia. Nitpicking doesn’t change that.

I'm leaning towards expulsion. He had already been told not to do it yet he continued to do so and ended up breaking someone's arm. It's pretty bad and if I was the ladies family I would be a bit cross if it was just excused.

Expelling him is so over the top though, there are so many other consequences that don't stop a child from doing something they love and are clearly good at.

How is her relationship to other people relevant?

60 is elderly these days is it?

He should be kicked out, permanently. Let him find another sports club.

He definitely should be expelled. He’s 12, not 2, that’s plenty old enough to know that you don’t skateboard indoors, especially when he’d been reminded about it early in the day.

I broke my wrist in my early twenties. It healed well, however now I’m in my fifties I get a lot of pain from it and it stops me doing things I enjoy, and interferes with me walking because I use crutches. This injury could have a lot of repercussions for this woman.

And if another person is injured because he can’t follow simple instructions about safety? Does that not matter, as long as he is doing the sport he loves?

I wouldn't expel necessarily but I would suspend for a month or six weeks on the understanding next time he does get kicked out. That should give him time to learn his lesson. He should also be made to apologise to his victim and if it impacts any teammates he should be made to apologise to them too.

The club's response sounds reasonable to me, provided that the punishment was reasonably tough - e.g. a 3 month ban - and reinforced by a warning to him and all others that any repetition would lead to expulsion. I think the club has some responsibility, because it would surely make sense when they see a child come in with a skateboard to insist that he leave it at reception or something similar, given the obvious risk.

The notion of a load of adults ganging up on a 12 year old who has already been dealt with is pretty distasteful, I think.

I hope the lady who has the broken arm comes to his defence - IMO any decent person with even a smidgen of kindness in them would

wait a minute.
she was knocked over because the boy decided to ignore what he had been told that day

she suffered a serious injury and had to have an operation. It’s a fair bet she was in a lot of pain and may still be in pain if she had to have plates and pins put in.

her recovery time will be a minimum of 6 weeks. She might need physio too. She won’t be able to drive or do many everyday tasks

so it has a significant physical impact on her life. It might also give her a fear of being knocked over again, so that she is scared of crowded places

she might only get SSP and suffer financial hardship.

but you think she should be standing up for the brat who decided he wanted to be in his skateboard and nothing else mattered? He made a deliberate decision to get on the skateboard and a deliberate decision to ignore warnings.

strange you aren’t advocating for kindness to be shown to the victim too, maybe by the club recompensing her financially for herb pain and suffering and (if appropriate) for loss of earnings. Because that’s the decent thing to do.

Well clearly the hope is he takes the punishment, realises his mistake and it doesn't happen again.

Unfortunately, when you are involved with youth sports at a decent level you have to deal with their arsehole parents. At least 50% of parents involved in elite youth sports are arseholes!

These areholes forget that these are KIDS.

So this kid was stupid. But he's 12. He's a kid. He's been punished, but for parents to be threatening to boycott unless his is kicked out is horrible. They're arsehole parents

If your child is given the opportunity to belong to somewhere that you can only get in because of a certain skill then they must realise that they aren’t unique and take for granted the opportunity.

Those in charge are waiting for someone to give them a reason to get rid and then they can replace with an equally talented youngsters who would love to be a part of the club and who will follow the rules and will attend 100% of the time.

i imagine this boy is just a liability no matter what his talent and has taken this opportunity for granted. I imagine his parents can’t even contemplate that there Ds could be kicked out and lose his place.
If they did he wouldn’t have had a skateboard there in the first place.

If he's adequately punished and given a tough warning, then it's reasonable to believe that is enough to enable him to learn his lesson; especially if he's a good kid who is already shocked and mortified by the results of his actions. If you always rush to the ultimate sanction, you leave yourself with nowhere to go and and a disaffected child who has lost a chance to learn how to behave properly.

It's a difficult one.

If he had been skateboarding through a shopping centre and hit someone I wonder what the outcome would have been? A ban from the shopping centre would definitely be on the cards.

I think that a suspension at least, but wouldn't be surprised if he was expelled either.

Maybe he could do some gardening or something for the poor victim too.

I've read your update - before I read it, I wrote:

"I suspect it will boil down to how good he is.
If he's good they'll reprimand him and he'll get away with it.
If he's rubbish, they'll throw him out of the club and would do for less."

So I assume he's decent at the sport concerned.

Do you live in quite an affluent area where the parents are Stepford and think their kids would never be so stupid? Their reaction seems a bit over the top.

A broken bone is a killer in older people and the chances of the lady returning to her previous independence and function is very low. The club need to make sure it's taken seriously. I hope there's insurance in place to pay for the care she'll need
The grandmother might only be in her 50s, she's not necessarily a frail 90 year old! That doesn't mean it's ok for a kid who can't follow rules to knock her over.

From a medical perspective, over 65 is elderly. Fractures heal slower. Getting back to baseline takes longer, if it ever. It's something like 30-50% of people will die within a year after a hip fracture. Calling someone in their 60s elderly or older in this situation isn't an insult.

You think his punishment should be a ban from skateboarding in the grounds, when he's already ignored a ban from skating in the building?
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If he had been skateboarding through a shopping centre and hit someone I wonder what the outcome would have been? A ban from the shopping centre would definitely be on the cards

Maybe but it seems to be ok for smaller kids to scoot round shopping centres o their infernal scooters and nobody seems to care if they knock over elderly (or not so elderly) people.

It was a broken arm. Not a hip fracture.

He’s 12. It was an accident.

Unless he deliberately rammed the skateboard at speed into the woman and skated off without a care.

She probably had an awkward, unlucky fall. Annoying behaviour from the boy and I definitely would expect a sincere apology and an indication that he understands the seriousness of what his disregard for the rules has caused.

Yes, some people who blow things out of all proportion. Where did I suggest anything like that? Some of the posts on this thread demonstrate very clearly why there are entitled young brats running around thinking that the rules of society don’t apply to them. Breaking someone’s arm while doing something you’ve been told not to do because it’s dangerous isn’t silly. He chose to ignore the warnings and did it anyway and caused a serious accident. Not suggesting for a moment that we should’ burn him at the stake’ but neither should we minimise the seriousness of what he did. His punishment should teach him that his actions have consequences, and that harm caused to others will reflect back on him.