A 14-year-old Kansas teen, Jaylee Chillson, whose parents say was in therapy for relentless bullying at her school, fatally shot herself in front of a police officer after her family reported that she left their home to attend a party she was told she was not allowed to go to.
In a Sept. 18 statement from the Cloud County Sheriff’s Office, police say they were contacted on Sept. 16 at about 11:25 p.m. by a Clay Center resident who asked for help locating a 14-year-old female family member who was “believed to have run away, and was thought to be attending a party near Aurora, Kansas.”
A deputy then responded to an outdoor field party attended by college and high school students that was being held in Aurora. Jaylee was eventually located, and the officer tried to convince her to return home. As the officer was escorting her to his patrol vehicle, “she pulled out a firearm and shot herself.”
Investigators made it clear that “the deputy did not draw his firearm” but did not state where Jaylee got the gun she used to shoot herself. The statement said the deputy worked with an off-duty firefighter to try to save her life but she was pronounced dead at the scene shortly after midnight.
It was also noted that “multiple partygoers witnessed the incident and offered interviews” and the investigation into the shooting is still underway.
Jaylee’s father, Jeb Chillson, who is a former EMT, told DailyMail.com that his daughter left the family home after she was told she was not allowed to go to the party. He said he was helping the police with the search for his daughter when he heard a gunshot.
“I heard people talking about a gun. I hear a gunshot ring out, and I call the dispatch and ask if their deputy shot, and they said no, but they hear reports of shots fired,” he said.
“They told me not to go in there, but I said [I] used to be an EMT, I can help. When I got closer, they told me that there was a girl shot, so I took off running. I see my daughter on the ground, being held up by one of the partygoers. As I come up to the deputy, he tells me that she pulled the gun out and shot herself as he was going over to her,” Jeb Chillson recalled.
“I told them that we needed to call for a helicopter and an ambulance. We’re putting pressure on her, and when the paramedic got there, they had already made up their minds about her,” he added.
He argued that when he arrived on the scene, he and the officer confirmed his daughter still had a pulse “but the paramedic didn’t check or do anything.”
“I started doing CPR on my daughter for about 10 minutes. I told them that I wasn’t going to let my daughter die without trying. I’m begging them to give her an IV and to help me, but he wouldn’t. I asked him if it was about the money, then I’ll pay for it, and he starts laughing at me as I’m trying to save my daughter,” the distraught father said.
The teenager’s parents said their daughter, who had dreams of becoming a diesel mechanic, had been bullied for years while she attended schools in the Clay County Unified School District beginning in the seventh grade, but they got no help from school officials.
Jeb Chillson told The Messenger News that when his daughter attended Clay Center Community Middle School one boy encouraged her to cut herself, and a girl once dumped rubber cement in her hair in class as others watched.
“One girl was threatening to kill my daughter [on social media],” her father recalled.
The Kansas father said they moved their daughter to a different middle school in the school district but the bullying continued.
“My daughter would come in covered in bruises and stuff like that. The bullies were there. Nothing stopped,” he said, noting that his daughter was also sexually harassed.
“One of them grabbed her crotch in a sexual manner against her will,” he said. “The same boy was bruising her up. He took her Air Pods and stole money from her.”
-Christian Post
