Sharon Chanon Velázquez strikes plea with MA court in Phoebe Prince case

Sharon Chanon Velázquez (17) has struck a plea deal with the Massachusetts prosecutors in the Phoebe Prince bulling court case. Another four students charged in the suicide case have agreed to submit plea deals to the court.

If Velázquez's agreement is accepted by the judge this would be the first criminal case resolved with relation the 15-year-old County Clare student's suicide.A source close to the teen's plea negotiations told the Associated Press the deals are expected to be presented in court next week, where they must be approved by a judge.

Five of the six defendants have agreed to admit to a misdemeanor as prosecutors agree to drop more serious charges against them in a trade off, it has been reported. The teenagers accused of bullying the Irish-born 15-year-old Prince before she took her own life, will be permitted to admit to less serious crimes of harassment, according to a report in the Boston Globe.

Kayla Narey, Sharon Chanon Velázquez, Ashley Longe, Sean Mulveyhill, and Flannery Mullins, all former students of the Boston high school faced both felony and misdemeanor charges which included civil rights violations causing bodily injury, criminal harassment, and disruption of a school assembly.

Flannery and Velázquez were also facing charges for stalking the County Clare teenager.

Mulveyhill was charged with statutory rape, however sources say these charges will be dropped as part of the agreement.

Velázquez’s attorney Colin Keefe refused to comment directly on the rumors surrounding the upcoming deposition.

“I am confident that the public opinion about my client will drastically change at the appropriate time when the true facts are revealed,’’ he told the Boston Globe.

Students of South Hadley High School said that 15-year-old Irish girl Phoebe Prince was subject to repeated bullying and was "chased around the perimeter of the school" while teachers did nothing shortly before she took her own life.

Some pupils who knew Prince well told the Boston Herald that she was chased by a group of bullies who weren't happy with the fact that Phoebe had a date with a senior football player.

On the day she committed suicide by hanging herself, a soda can was thrown at her out of a passing car.

The students also elaborated on the forms of bullying Prince underwent, including online harassment and text messages, before she hung herself in her home in South Hadley last month.

Prince, from Co. Clare but living in South Hadley, Massachusetts since September 2009 with her family, took her own life after a tirade of verbal and cyber bullying.
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