NJ superintendent resigns after bullied 14-year-old girl's suicide

The superintendent of New Jersey's Central Regional School District, Triantafillos Parlapanides, has resigned days after he said Adriana Olivia Kuch, the 14-year-old who committed suicide 48 hours after being assaulted in her high school, made "poor choices," including drug usage.

According to NBC News, on Saturday the school district posted on their website, "The Central Regional School District Board of Education has accepted the resignation of Dr. Triantafillos Parlapanides. The Central Regional family continues to mourn the loss of one of our children. We are all praying for the family and loved ones and our entire community."

"The Central Regional School District is evaluating all current and past allegations of bullying," the statement added.

According to The New York Post, "Parlapanides tried to shift blame for Adriana Kuch's Feb. 3 suicide to her family, claiming her father's 'affair' and her own drug use was causing turmoil in her life."

On Friday, the Daily Mail posted answers Parlapanides to questions they had sent him. The outlet asked, "What services were provided to Kuch before she died, it's believed she had been relentlessly bullied for some time before her death?"

Parlapanides answered, "After [Adriana's] mother's suicide since her father was having an affair at the end of her 6th grade Her father married the woman he had an affair with and moved her into the house."

"Her grades and choices declined in 7th and 8th grade," the superintendent, whose salary was $190,000-a-year, said.

Adriana Kuch's mother had battled addiction and passed away in 2015 according to Kuch's father, Michael.

In the hallways of Central Regional High School in Berkeley Township on February 1, four students allegedly attacked Kuch. The incident was captured in a video that later went viral online. Ocean County prosecutors reportedly told Michael Kuch's father that at least three of the girls involved were facing criminal charges and all four were suspended indefinitely from school.

The video showed Adriana Kuch walking in her school hallway next to her boyfriend when another girl slams a water bottle into face. After the initial blow, Kuch collapses and then the girl continues to hit her while at least two young girls cheer off camera.

"I want the entire world to know what these animals did to my daughter," Michael Kuch, a  22-year Army veteran, said, adding that "a kid is assaulted with a weapon and their policy is not to call the police or file a report."

On February 3, Kuch's family members found her dead in a closet in her Bayville home.