An elementary school teacher was fired after she was caught on camera kicking and grabbing a 5-year-old because the kid hid behind a bookshelf during library class in kindergarten.
In disturbing footage, Crystal Smith, who worked at Bluejacket Flint elementary school, is seen pulling a little girl out of the bookshelf she hid in and kicking her.
Allegedly, the young girl reported the incident to her homeroom teacher who didn’t care to take the matter to the school’s administration.
“I don’t like my teacher. She’s really mean. She hit me on my arm,” the girl told her mother as she picked her up from school. Inspecting her body, the mum also discovered a large red mark that wasn’t there before.
Furious mother then contacted the principal and demanded an explanation. Eventually, the mom met with Smith who maintained innocence and told her that the girl alone was responsible for her bruise.
“I’m not surprised she has some marks on her. She was crawling in the bookshelf. She has a red spot on her arm. And I’m not surprised because she shoved herself into that bookshelf… I mean, she kicked me a couple of times,” the teacher claimed.
Fortunately, CCTV footage revealed what really happened in the library.
“When I saw the video it was heartbreaking, because everything she said, she sat at the same table as me and just lied about everything … she lied to me. She lied to everyone else. She was almost really convincing,” the upset mother said in an interview with KCTV5.
“I can’t really even put it into words. I hurt for my child, and I was just angry that someone could do that.”
Following the discovery, Smith was put on leave and fired after the investigation was concluded.
“The Shawnee Mission School District was deeply distressed by the actions shown in the video.point 366 |
We take our responsibility to keep our children safe extremely seriously, and as parents and educators, we are heartbroken whenever a child is not treated with love and respect,” the Shawnee Mission School District expressed after the incident went viral.point 218 | 1
“As soon as we discovered what happened, we acted to remove the teacher from contact with students, and proceeded immediately to terminate that teacher.”
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