Greenfield middle and high schoolers staging fights and posting on social media, police say

UPDATED: 9:34 PM 3/7/16

Dozens of disturbing fight videos are circulating the web, and in some of those videos are students in South Monterey County. Greenfield Police are in collaboration with the school districts to try and stop these staged fights. One of the videos shows a girl completely blindsided as her classmate slugs her in the face. Police said they aren’t just play fights. One of the girls took multiple hits to the head while other classmates stood by and recorded it. Greenfield’s campus officer, Armando Mendoza said the violent behavior is becoming a big issue.

“Some of them do it because they want to show off. Some of them do it because they want to hurt people, and some of them do it for peer pressure,” said Officer Mendoza.

Police said the most recent fights happened less than a month ago. Authorities are calling them, “staged fights,” where students set up a place and time to throw down.Greenfield police said that the fights generally take place in open fields or dirt lots, places where a brawl is hard to spot. South Monterey County Union School District said if a fight occurs off campus, it has to be dealt with differently. Instead of expulsion the student could face temporary suspension, and police could follow through with charges.

“It’s not enough just to do that sometimes. We typically will also develop a contract with the student and their family if they’re going to come back on to our campus there are certain things they have to meet,” said Daniel Moirao with Monterey County Joint Union School District.

The school district said part of the student contract could be meeting with a school counselor to get to the root of the problem for why kids act out so violently. Officer Mendoza said he’s reviewed some of the violent video in disbelief because of how hard it is to watch.

“Being that theres these things happening in your city and you’re not present to be able to stop it. At least we are happy that we are doing something about it,” said Officer Mendoza.

Fights prompted Greenfield Police to hold special workshops this month, on topics like bullying, sexting, and peer pressure. The first meeting will take place this Wednesday at 6 p.m. in the Greenfield Civic Center.

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Some middle schoolers in Greenfield are taking to social media, staging fights and posting them online, according to police.

The Greenfield Police Department said its trying to get the word out to parents, to prevent anyone else from getting hurt.

KION’s Brandon Castillo will have more on what the school district is doing in light of the issue, at 5PM and 6PM.

Meanwhile, police will be hosting workshops every Wednesday at 6 PM on the following topics:

March 2nd – Partners in Crime Prevention
March 9th – Peer Pressure for Parents and Teens
March 16th – Bullying
March 23rd – Sexting
March 30th – Emotional Health for Youth