MESQUITE, Texas — A Texas woman claims she is the victim of a hate crime after she was attacked in an elementary school playground for protecting a bullied 4-year-old boy.

The attack left Sondra Scarber, 27, with a shattered jaw that’s been wired shut, and a is badly swollen and bruised face.

“I can’t do anything for myself,” she said through tears.

GANEU TIKVA, Israel -- A teenage lesbian was attacked by a group of ultra-Orthodox yeshiva students in Ganei Tikva in the center of the country on Sunday, Yedioth Ahronoth reported on Wednesday.

The 17-year-old alleged that she was assaulted because of her sexual orientation and appearance. She told police that she encountered a group of students outside their yeshiva while she was walking in a religious neighborhood, after taking her bicycle to be repaired.

MOBILE, Ala. -- An Alabama man has been charged with second-degree assault for brutally beating a woman because she is in a relationship with his sister and he does not approve.

Travis Hawkins Jr., 18, was booked into Mobile, Ala., jail on Sunday after turning himself in to authorities for the Thanksgiving Day assault on 23-year-old Mallory Owens. Hawkins bonded out the same day.

Who was the first human bully? As I contemplate October’s designation as National Bullying Prevention Awareness Month, I wonder that very thing.

If we see bullies as individuals who assert their dominance over a weaker individual to achieve their own ends, was it the first human that recognized themselves as stronger and hungrier than the rest of the tribe? We see and understand this trait in animals but, in an enlightened civilization, why does it continue to happen among humans?