Ryan Halligan, a 13-year-old American, committed suicide on Oct. 7, 2003 after suffering bullying at his seventh grade school. Several reasons may have led to the boy's death: he was ridiculed by the most popular girl in the school publicly, his "friend" spread that he was gay, had learning difficulties, was persecuted and humiliated by one of his teachers and suffered cyberbullying In the early days of the Internet.