The charging of nine teenagers in the tragic suicide of Irish student Phoebe Prince in South Hadley Massachusetts is no more than what they deserved.

Yet the failure to charge any adults at the school with at least negligence in her case is puzzling.

The heartbreaking evidence released by the prosecutor shows that adult supervisors witnessed and did nothing about the extreme bullying the 15-year-old girl underwent on her last days on earth.

That included heavy bullying in the library before a supervisor who did absolutely nothing to stop it or report it.

The entire school leadership, given that there were previous incidents of bad bullying at the school, deserves to be reprimanded and in some cases sacked over this tragic episode.

One can make no excuse for adults who watched and did nothing while a young girl was bullied to death hanging herself in a closet when it all became too much for her.

Her crime was being asked out on a date by a popular high school football player, which incensed the mean girls in the school, one of whom fancied the player herself.

One can only imagine what the young Irish girl went through as a posse of at least nine kids made her life hell day after day and she was powerless to stop it.

The fact that she had recently arrived from Ireland, that her family were settling in and that she had few friends must have made it incredibly difficult for her to cope with the growing bullying.

The lack of a support network proved fatal in the end for Phoebe, a young emigrant in a strange land who had so much to deal with in such a short time.

The fact that no adult stepped in to help her is a shameful reality and one that will haunt the school authorities forever more. It was simply inexcusable.

The good work of the prosecutor in charging the teenagers with liability in the death is to be praised but the fact that the adults got off scot-free is regretful. Either way they must live with the horrifying reality of what they allowed to happen before their very eyes.