A pupils' formal at a Waterside hotel had to be called off last Friday night after a teenage guest allegedly caused a "fracas", which resulted in three people being injured.
The Top of the Hill Year 12 Formal, which was organised by parents of the pupils rather than the school itself, ended in disaster.
The event organiser, who does not wish to be named, claims that all the careful planning and preparation by pupils a
nd parents ended in ruins.
"It was all going great until one boy who had been invited started a fight and ruined it for everyone," she told FN yesterday. "We tried to plan a perfect night out, and we'd had our meal and the disco had just began when it got out of hand. I think it began by two boys fighting over a girl, typically," she alleged.
The organiser went on to claim: "This one boy just got out of control and in the end, three people were injured so we had to call it off quickly. My husband, who was acting as security for the evening, was injured and has to have three fractures pinned back in hospital later this week. Besides that, one 17-year-old pupil was also injured and even the man who was doing the disco ended up getting headbutted. So even though we wanted to carry on, we had to stop it. Even the Hotel Manager told us that enough was enough."
'Perfectly behaved'
The event organiser praised the other pupils in attendance, claiming they were "perfectly behaved" throughout.
"It's such a shame, we are absolutely gutted. Everyone was looking forward to this so much but just one person caused this whole fracas," she claimed. "Although it was nothing to do with the school, we had invested a lot of our own time and spent so much money on it and it was all over by 11pm."
Police in Derry confirmed that they were called to the Broomhill Hotel after a reported disturbance last Friday. Police arrived in the scene at 10.30pm but by that stage, organisers had decided to call the event off.
The full article contains 364 words and appears in Foyle News newspaper.
