SEMINOLE COUNTY, Fla. – A 15-year-old accused of planning to stab one of her classmates at Lake Brantley High School has written a letter to the judge in her case asking for sympathy.
Isabelle Valdez has been held at the jail in Seminole County since January. Investigators say she and co-defendant Lois Lippert planned to stab a boy in a bathroom at Lake Brantley High School and were only stopped the day of the alleged attack after an anonymous tip.
Minutes after their arrest, both girls were caught on patrol car video laughing together. But months later, Valdez’s tone in writing is strikingly different.
“I’m very remorseful for my actions,” Valdez writes in the opening line of the letter, which was sent to the judge and filed with the Seminole County Clerk of Court this week.
In the letter, Valdez writes that being away from everything since her arrest — “isolated from people, the internet” — has changed her perspective on life.
“I was exposed to the internet at a very young age, and all that was bad stemmed from it,” she writes. “The internet made me a horrible person.”
News 6 spoke to an expert on mental health and teens, Dr. Cherlette McCullough with Center Peace Couples and Family Therapy, about the letter.
“That letter is very interesting,” McCullough said.
McCullough says the letter reads less like an excuse and more like a psychological portrait.
“This letter, psychologically, it’s not that she was giving an excuse, but it sounds like she was telling how I ended up in this place,” McCullough said.
In the three-page letter, Valdez describes her struggles and experiences since childhood. She also references joining an online true crime community she calls “TCC,” writing that the group “promoted violence” and that she was groomed into “believing that violence was good.” Court documents also confirm Valdez referenced the TCC in the patrol car after her arrest, saying they were “were supposed to spread our story around the TCC.”
“These behaviors that we’re seeing, they go right along with a teen living in isolation or feeling unloved, feeling rejected, feeling alone, which would drive a teen to join a group like she says she was a part of online that promoted violence,” McCullough said.
Valdez also writes about co-defendant Lippert in the letter, saying, “we both got worse together.”
According to prosecutors, Valdez told investigators she had been planning the attack for months. She reportedly told investigators that she was obsessed with deceased Sandy Hook shooter Adam Lanza and planned to kill a student at Lake Brantley High School who she said resembled him.
Lippert is accused of helping Valdez sharpen the knife in a bathroom, as well as testing its sharpness against her own skin and Valdez’s shirt, court documents state.
“This is what it looks like when we have teens who are suffering in silence, but on the outside, it looks like they’re totally fine,” McCullough said. “It sounds like this is a teen who has had years of psychological struggles.”
Valdez ends the letter saying that when she was detained, she started acting “recklessly and edgy” and made “everything sound worse than it was” because she wanted help.
“I’ve been thinking about my life and my choices,” she writes, asking the judge for sympathy. “I’m not the same girl.”
“This is why it’s important for parents to have conversations with their children. This is why it’s important for parents to understand who their children are connecting with, what they’re doing in their downtime,” McCullough said. “This is a perfect example of why it’s so important for parents to get involved in their children’s lives. And not just getting involved by saying, ‘who are you hanging out with?’ But literally going into their computers and finding out what are they doing on their downtime.”
Valdez and Lippert were initially processed through the juvenile court system before the Seminole County State Attorney’s Office made the decision to prosecute both as adults. During a hearing in March, a judge ruled there was too much of a danger to the community for the two girls to be released on bond.