Police Search For Missing Teen Who Family Says Has Bipolar Disorder
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) -- Police are searching for a teen who went missing after she left her school in Brooklyn on Monday.
Nashaly Perez was last seen leaving P.S. 371 located at 355 37th St., also known as Lillian L Rashkis High School, at around noon, police said.
Perez's family told 1010 WINS' Al Jones the 15-year-old suffers from Bipolar disorder.
Police Search For Missing Teen Who Family Says Has Bipolar Disorder
Perez's mother, Sandra Rodriquez, said the girl was to have a full-time aide at the special needs school in Sunset Park, Jones reported.
Rodriquez said no one from the school called her and she only found out her daughter was gone when she went to pick her up. By then, she had been gone for an hour, Jones reported.
Through a translator, she told Jones no one at the school had any answers.
"Everyone stood where they were. Everyone kept doing what they were doing -- working, ignoring her as if she was nothing," the interpreter said.
Perez's mother called the school's response negligent, Jones reported.
The teen's father said Perez had encountered problems at the school, despite this being her first year there.
"She was bullied so many times, so many times," he said.
He said Perez has trouble communicating and needs her medication.
"I'm very worried about her," her mother told CBS 2's Dave Carlin.
New York City Schools Chancellor Carmen Farina said Perez's disappearance was concerning.
"I am deeply concerned about this student and we have school support on site as we work with the NYPD to investigate this matter," Farina said in a statement.
Sources told 1010 WINS the principal of the school has been reassigned.
"I'd like the district attorney to dig into this. I'd like the mayor to dig into this," attorney David Perecman said, who is working with the Rodriguez family.
Perecman also represented the family of Avonte Oquendo, a student with autism who ran from his school in Long Island City last October. Avonte was later found in the East River.
The family's lawyer says what the two cases have in common are school officials losing track of children, who by law require constant supervision, and taking too long to sound the alarm.
Perez was last seen wearing a white bandana, red blouse, black jeans and red & black sneakers. She is described as 5'3" tall and weighing 120 pounds, police said.
Anyone with information regarding Perez's whereabouts is urged to call the NYPD's Crime Stoppers Hotline at 800-577-TIPS.
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