HUNTERDON COUNTY, New Jersey (LifeSiteNews) – Catholic pro-life high school student Nichole Pagano was attacked while holding a pro-life sign at a pro-abortion protest on campus, leaving her with scratches on her arm and legs and a hurt shoulder.
According to Catholic News Agency, New Jersey Hunterdon Central Regional High School was harshly criticized after student Pagano was attacked while at the May 16 rally.
“You’ve got to just do what your heart says and what you believe in. You’ve got to do what’s right,” 16-year-old Nichole told CNA. “Even if it’s sometimes hard to do, you go to do it to make a stand and make a point.”
Nichole felt called to stand up for the unborn after she and her sister, Vanessa, saw about 200 students gathering on campus for an unsanctioned protest. Accordingly, she approached the crowd carrying a sign reading, “Equal Rights For Babies in the Womb.”
Nichole recounted that “there’s like 200 kids there and then all of a sudden they come surrounding us — mostly trying to come at me and attack me because I had the sign — and then they came at me all up in my face, verbally screaming at me, and physically even grabbed me and ripped me down,” she said.
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Seven students have been suspended from Hunterdon Central Regional High School in New Jersey after a rowdy pro-abortion protest by students resulted in the physical and verbal assault of a sophomore holding a pro-life sign.https://t.co/Y4zlwDfO2c
— EWTN Pro-Life Weekly (@EWTNProLife) May 28, 2022
Following this, Nichole had scratches on her arm and legs and what her father described as a “sore shoulder.”
Following the protest, seven students were suspended and another seven were given “extended detentions.” School superintendent Jeffrey Moore held a live-streamed school board meeting on May 23 to discuss the protest.
“I want to reiterate, certainly the most distressing moments of this incident were in the behavior that was shown to counter-protesters who had arrived and those involved,” Moore said.
“Shoving, expletive-laden verbal aggression, vandalism to signs, signs were knocked over, thrown, kicked, all of those things that made this a most distressing and disrespectful scene and example of student behavior against a student there who showed up with another viewpoint.”
Moore claimed that some school and town police officers were “near that student so that she would have that presence nearby as we continue to work to dissipate the crowd.”
A member of the crowd immediately responded to this saying, “That’s a lie.”
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According to Nichole, both school principal Edward Brandt and Moore publicly apologized to her.
“It didn’t seem like too big of an apology, though,” Nichole said, referring to Brandt’s apology. “It kind of seemed like a quick, short, little apology. It didn’t seem very long and even that concerning.
At the meeting, New Jersey state assemblyman Erik Peterson harshly criticized the school’s response to the situation, saying Nichole “is the victim, not the ‘counter-protester.’ She was assaulted. It’s on video.”
“The problem, from my perspective, is the leadership,” he added. “These kids didn’t learn this on their own, they learned it here. And it starts with this board and the superintendent.”
The school was asked if they followed up on Nichole to ensure her future safety. A spokesperson launched into a lengthily description of their response while failing to answer the question.
Nichole revealed that after the public apology, she “didn’t hear anything from anyone.” Likewise, she said, and her father confirmed, that the school failed to contact her parents.
This past month, news of the potential outlawing of abortion in parts of the U.S. has sparked violence against pro-lifers and pro-life organizations across America, which is apparently spreading to schools.