Summer’s son was locker boxing with one of his buddies and his friend knocked some of his teeth out. Summer wants to press charges, but her son asked the other boy to fight so he doesn’t want her to get involved. Is locker boxing just a part of playing hockey or should Summer go to the school and raise son hell?
Jonathan: Today we have summer on with us. Hey, Summer.
Summer: Hey. How’s it going?
Jonathan: It’s going okay. Your problem is I guess your son got into a bit of a kerfuffle at school. What happened?
Summer: Yeah. I have a teenager. He’s 14 years old. He came home from hockey the other day, and I noticed that his face was really swollen and he was missing teeth.
Ayla: Oh, my gosh.
Jonathan: Oh, yeah.
Summer: It was a pretty big deal. We rushed him to the emergency room. And I’m asking him what happened. It seemed like he didn’t really want to tell me that much, but I finally pulled it out of him. There’s this thing that they do in the locker rooms called locker boxing.
Jonathan: Do you know about this?
Ayla: Vaguely. I’ve heard. I don’t play hockey, but my husband did. I’ve talked about that many times. But he’s explained locker boxing at some point while we were dating. Basically you punch okay, this is going to hurt, you wear your helmet and your gloves, but you take someone on in the locker room and you punch them and you fight. And it’s supposed to be just fun.
Jonathan: With your team.
Ayla: Yeah, it’s against your own teammates, but no one usually gets injured. But in your case, you’re saying your 14 year old son lost teeth?
Summer: Yes. You keep the gloves on and they basically beat the crap out of each other.
Jonathan: So obviously he took the worst of it.
Ayla: I would assume so.
Summer: I mean, we’re talking maybe cosmetic surgery. You have to replace teeth. You know, is this is a is a very serious situation and teeth aren’t cheap.
Ayla: I mean, we know. They’re also not really replaceable.
Summer: The dollars they can add up.
Jonathan: I have a pretty important question, though. I mean with this locker boxing thing, was this your son that instigated this or was it the other kid?
Summer: Well, this is why he didn’t want to open up. But I finally pulled it out of him. And, you know, he did it. He was the one that instigated it. He thought that he would challenge someone that was bigger than him. And sure enough.
Ayla: Oh, man.
Jonathan: You are mad at who, then? Your son.
Summer: You know, I’m mad that there’s no one monitoring them. I mean, where are the adults? We pay a lot of money for them to be a part of these are after school activities. Where are the facilitators and the coaches and the assistant? I don’t understand.
Ayla: I feel your anger. And I would be mad at the other kid, too. I would be mad. I would sue the other family. Exactly.
Jonathan: What? You would sue them for dental?
Ayla: Yeah. If I if my even if my kid instigated it doesn’t mean that someone has to go along and actually beat the crap out of my son.
Summer: Exactly right. I want to sue their parents. I want them to pay for his lost teeth. We need to be reimbursed. I want to sue the school, too. I mean, this is unacceptable.
Jonathan: Do you agree with Summer that she should sue the school and sue the parents of this other kid? Because, again, her kid went up to a bigger kid and said, hey, let’s locker box.
Ayla: And the other kid was like, okay.
Jonathan: He beat the crap out of him. Summer thank you so much.
Summer: Thank you
