Sixteen year old Schermiela Palmer had been running laps at Beach Channel High School in Far Rockaway collapsed on the track and later died at a hospital. One student told the Post, "We were running around. We did two laps, I think, and I looked at her and she looked at me and she fell." Her family is stunned and says she had no known health problems, though her mother said she complained because students were "pushed" in gym class. One of her friends told the Post that since Palmer failed gym last year, she was wanted to try hard this year.
Newsday reports that Palmer's father is interested in the autopsy, "particularly because he said he was told by eyewitnesses that no one on the field came to his daughter's aid." Other accounts do say that a teacher tried to perform CPR, but apparently a defibrillator was not on the field, and the EMT arrived when a teacher retrieved one. The Post adds that earlier this week, a Brooklyn student collapsed during gym class; she was revived.
