Winston now stands tall at 6’1. He shot up in the past few years, his mother says, and started working out with weights and doing self-defence training to build his confidence. He lost one year of school as he recovered.

Things are better on this sunny day, as he looks around at his old surroundings. He notices a few changes to the neighbourhood. There’s a new building beside the school in a spot where he remembers a small baseball field.

Winston no longer shows signs of being upset and has learned how to accept what happened. He now knows what he needs to do in case it ever happens again.

The school board says it has taken steps to address how it deals with bullies since Winston was targeted. But it also fought tooth and nail against the legal action launched by the Karams. The school board and its lawyers from an insurance company appealed an earlier court defeat, denying for years that they had done anything wrong.

Vania Karam produced emails in court showing how she had tried to reach out to school officials appealing for help.

After Winston's anxiety attack in April 2012, she wrote to the principal and two senior school board officials - superintendent Francis Wiley and chief executive officer Jennifer Adams asking for help. She also told them she wanted an apology for their lackadaisical response to the situation.

The school responded by criticizing Winston that year in his final report card dated June 29, 2012.

“... peer relationships are inappropriate and need to be monitored and corrected," the school wrote in the report. "More positive dialogue and interaction between adults and Winston is needed. Problem solving, organization and other basic skills required in a learning environment are also need (sic) of improvement. I wish Winston all the best for a safe and happy summer!”

Comments inserted into Winston Karam's report card by Broadview Public School in June 2012. Screenshot image.

Vania Karam says she saw this report card as an attempt to blame the victim. It was the last straw that drove her to the courts.

The school board was forced to end its denials on May 24 this year when an Ontario Superior Court concluded that school officials and teachers were negligent for ignoring Winston’s problems and failing to protect him from bullying. The court ordered the school board to pay about $3,500 in damages to the Karam family in a scathing decision that concluded the school officials were lacking credibility.

The legal team working for the Karams say it’s the first reported North American case of a court ruling that blames an institution for turning a blind eye to school yard bullying. It may set a new standard for all schools across the continent.

Tami Cogan, a paralegal hired by Vania Karam, says the lawyers were only able to find one similar case in Australia.

Cogan specializes in education law and has had some other experiences involving school boards that were reluctant to deal with bullying issues in court. So she believes this would make it a precedent-setting case that will raise the bar - at least for schools in Ontario.

"This case will be very beneficial in dealing with school boards across the province," says Cogan.

Vania Karam also says she had hoped that the school board's top officials would have shown some more accountability.

When I ask the school board questions about the case, it responds with a statement explaining that it now hopes to learn from the unfortunate incidents and improve its practices.

According to the Ontario government's sunshine list, Adams, the school board's chief executive, earned a salary of over $242,000 last year while Wiley, the superintendent, earned more than $162,000.

Neither were available for interviews to speak about what went wrong.