
Yes and he should be punished and held accountable for and also be disciplined. Like... this one time, My cousin and I got into a fight at 10 and he hit me hard with a tree branch, like a loud wack and everything. I had a huge welt on my side. His dad (my uncle) snatched me up in his arms, took me inside to my aunt, who got me balm and soothed me... my cousin looked horrified at my welt... he even felt sick... my uncle (his dad) walked up to my cousin, look down and with no baby talk, dead serious sternly spoke to him "man to man", told him that a real man never hits a woman... no matter what! He was punished, assisted in yard work under my uncle's supervision and never laid a hand on another girl, even me when we would play fight, he refused to even pretend hit me.

I agree with most of what you are saying. Maybe I misunderstood your first comment because English isn’t my strong suit. But from what I got from reading it was that it’s not the young boys fault and he shouldn’t be punished accordingly, because it’s his father fault he thinks this is okay. It sounds like you were defending or trying to justify his actions by blaming it all on his dad (which is true it’s his dads fault he thinks it’s okay to act like this) but seriously injuring her like that was his own actions.
Okay what Ballesac did was a jerk move. But How old is he? 10? ....did you see his face? He looks scared or remorseful. I mean, They're still little kids . It is not too late to teach him right from wrong. It's like, you got to discipline a 10 year old to learn better.... HOWEVER knowing the JERK DAD, he's going to SCREW UP and do the exact wrong thing on teaching his kid a valuable lesson in self responsibility.
This could have been an important TURNING POINT lesson to Ballesac about acting on impulse and the consequences of his action. But of course the dad is going to to do something STUPID and most likely blame the girl Tia. Which will perpetrate in the little boy, that girls are to blame for the violence that happen to them, victim blaming and this child will grow up twisted and messed up because his dad doesn't know how to raise a kid.
It really sucks this important lesson that could have changed this boy into a better person, is going to be screwed up by the dad.