In 2024, checking your child’s report card and attending parent-teacher conferences don’t cut it.
With kids attached to devices more than ever, law enforcement officials are imploring parents to be fully aware of the digital world they enter once the bedroom door shuts.
To support that message, the family of Tristyn Bailey, the 13-year-old Durbin Crossing girl killed by schoolmate Aiden Fucci in 2021, will take part in two online safety panels beginning this Thursday. The first event was cancelled due to Hurricane Milton.
Here are the two sessions:
October 17, 6pm-8pm
Tocoi Creek HS
11200 St. Johns Parkway St. Augustine, FL 32092
October 24, 6pm-8pm
Bartram Trail HS
7399 Longleaf Pine Parkway St. Johns, FL 32259
“As parents, when we give our kids access to social media, we have to teach them the responsibilities and dangers of the internet, similar to teaching them how to drive a car,” Tristyn’s dad, Forrest Bailey, told The Citizen.
“On behalf of the entire Bailey family, we hope to see you at one of these informative and eye opening sessions as we honor Tristyn’s memory by helping educate others on the dangers of social media,” he said.
Moms and dads, officials said, should prioritize attendance as much as they do the weekly cheer practices and T-ball games.
The St. Johns County Sheriff’s Office, Homeland Security Investigations and the slain cheerleader’s kin will host the events and all members of the public are welcome.
The seminars will include a presentation featuring HSI’s iGuardian online safety curriculum, a self-defense demonstration by female law enforcement officers, and panel discussions with the Bailey family, SJSO detectives, and HSI Special Agents.
The panels — which are tailored for middle and high school students and their parents — will also highlight relevant local cases, SJSO said. Some of the materials presented will deal with mature subject matter.
Bailey’s body was discovered on Mother’s Day in 2021, hours after her parents, Stacy and Forrest Bailey, reported her missing.
On the night of her death, Fucci asked Bailey, who he knew from Patriot Oaks Academy, to meet him at a friend’s house.
He was later seen on a home security camera walking with the cheerleader towards a retention pond near where she was later found.
Fucci was charged as an adult for the horrific crime and ultimately was sentenced to life in prison in March of 2023.
