Arizona police uncover chilling 'murder plot by 5th grade girls against cheating boyfriend'

Daily Mail​

3 days ago

A group of fifth grade girls planned to murder their male classmate after he allegedly cheated on and broke up with one of them, police said.
The four female students at a K-8 charter school in Surprise, Arizona, planned to stab the boy in the stomach and leave a phony suicide note, according to a police report obtained by AZFamily.
The students, aged 10 to 11-years-old, hatched the scheme while at a lunch table during recess at Legacy Traditional School's West Surprise campus on October 1, 2024, the report claimed.
Police said each girl had been assigned a role in the chilling plot. One would bring the knife, while another would write the suicide note to make it appear as though the boy ended his own life.
The third girl would stand as a lookout, while the fourth would stab him to death.
The plan was to lure him to an outside bathroom on the north side of the school building, according to police.
The girls even planned to wear gloves to avoid leaving fingerprints on the murder weapon, the report said.
The plot was foiled after another student overheard the plan and heard one of the girls say they wanted to, 'just end him', according to police.
One of the students who overheard told their parent, who then contacted Assistant Principal Jerod Burleson.
Burleson, who has been employed at the school since 2023, told the school resource officer that an eyewitness had heard, 'a group of students planning to kill a student at school,' the police report said.
The next morning, on October 2, the girls came to the school's front office with their parents. Their bags were searched and they were individually questioned with their parents present.
All four children were arrested on charges of threatening and disorderly conduct, both of which were misdemeanor level crimes. They were charged as juveniles.
Three of the girls showed remorse, but the fourth kept smiling and laughing while making excuses for what she had done, according to the report.
Daily Mail approached Legacy Traditional School for further comment.
Surprise Police told the New York Post that the girls were released to their parents after their arrest and were suspended pending expulsion.
AZCentral confirmed that one of the students involved participated in a juvenile diversion program as an alternative to court proceedings.
This case bears some similarity to the 2014 'Slender Man' stabbing, when two 12-year-old Wisconsin girls lured their friend, also 12, into the woods and stabbed her over a dozen times.
This case bears some similarity to the 2014 'Slender Man' stabbing, when two 12-year-old Wisconsin girls lured their friend, also 12, into the woods and stabbed her over a dozen times.
Earlier this year, a judge made the controversial decision to initiate the release of Morgan Geyser, one of the girls who pleaded guilty to the stabbing.
The case also drew comparisons to the Netflix show Adolescence, in which a 13-year-old boy stabs a female classmate to death after being radicalized by content viewed online.
Child psychology experts have suggested that the girls involved in the alleged plot may have been exposed to inappropriate content on the internet and cautioned parents against allowing their children to have unfettered access.
'We should never ignore or dismiss delinquent behavior by young people, but we should address it with effective, evidence-based and promising interventions,'
Liz Ryan, administrator for the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, told AZCentral.