Teacher Charged With Attempted Murder for Beating Student

Teacher Charged With Attempted Murder
AOL News
July 10, 2009

A popular science teacher at an English Catholic school has been charged with attempted murder for allegedly beating a 14-year-old student on the head with a metal weight, British media said Friday.

Peter Harvey, 49, allegedly "snapped" and attacked Jack Waterhouse before a packed classroom at the All Saints Roman Catholic Comprehensive School in Mansfield, Nottinghamshire, The Telegraph reported.

Peter Harvey, a popular science teacher at a Catholic school in Nottinghamshire, England, was charged with attempted murder Friday for allegedly beating a student on the head with a metal object. Media reports said Harvey, 49, allegedly snapped and attacked 14-year-old Jack Waterhouse, right, after another student swore in class.

Harvey apparently lost control Wednesday after a student swore during a physics lesson. According to some accounts, Jack tried to intervene. Harvey allegedly picked up a metal measuring weight and began beating Jack on the head.

Two other pupils, a boy and girl, tried to come to Jack's aid and suffered minor injuries, the reports said.

Police and paramedics called to the scene found Jack lying in a pool of blood. The teenager was hospitalized in serious but stable condition Friday, the BBC said.

"Obviously, the whole class is traumatized. People send their children here from great distances because of its academic record and what happened is very much out of character for the school," Nottinghamshire Police Detective Superintendent Adrian Pearson told The Times of London newspaper.

Harvey, who is married and has two daughters at the school, had recently returned to work after being on sick leave for a stress-related condition, the Daily Mail said.
Former students described Harvey as an excellent teacher who was very popular with his pupils.

"I was never a fan of science, so it was a miracle I had Mr. Harvey. He's absolutely hilarious and inspires confidence in even the least scientifically minded," one wrote on the Rate My Teacher Web site.

Others wrote that Harvey made class fun and that "no other science teacher could compare."

"He was the best," one grad wrote.