MC police pick up ESS 5 year old; harass & assault him

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They almost certainly tried to work it out short of suing.

How do you know? Nothing was said in that article and it was very one sided. I'd like to hear from both sides and more importantly see the video.

Because otherwise it makes no sense that they would wait this long to sue.

Also: it’s what the plaintiff’s attorneys would typically do in this situation.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'd like to see the body cam as you are just getting the parents side who was not there. That kid needs a SN child care setting if they are eloping. There is far more to this story.

A 5 year old taking off—especially if his house is near school—is not so far outside the norm that it suggests “special
needs.” This does raise the question of how he was supervised when he took off, though.

At any rate, needing a special needs child care setting does not mean the cops get to talk about beating you incessantly.

I've seen some situations where a child was constantly running away from class, in some cases teachers had to basically assign one person to stay with the child during the entire school day or they would run away.

Yes. And I have seen situations where a child did this once because he had a new sibling and was mad about having to go to school in the middle of it all. The point is that the fact that it happened once doesn’t tell us anything about this kid specifically—and certainly not enough to say “oh, the adults in this situation probably did what they were supposed to and he was just too hard to control.”

Agreed. and if this cop could be that out of control with a defiant 5-year-old who knows what other stuff they're doing to adults

[Anonymous]

If the event occurred as described, that is horrible. Either way, it is horrible that the school supervised the kids so poorly that this child could elope from the building.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If the event occurred as described, that is horrible. Either way, it is horrible that the school supervised the kids so poorly that this child could elope from the building.

Sometimes it cannot be prevented as teachers are not allowed to put hands on/restrain kids so they are told to let them walk out but someone at least should have followed the child. There is far more to this we don't know and too many red flags.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Separate from the police I can’t believe people are focusing on the five year old leaving rather than the grown adults not supervising him well enough (this making it possible for all of this to happen.) if this happened with your child snd a babysitter would you be focused on the “misbehavior” or the appalling incompetence of the adult?

By age 5, my kids were playing on unfenced playgrounds, or playgrounds with gaps in fencing (this includes every public school playground in my area) without me watching them every second, with me, with babysitters, and at school. They were never there alone. There was always an adult close enough to hear them if they called for help, but that adult might be monitoring other children. If my kid walked off the playground while I was pushing his toddler sibling in the swing, I would absolutely have considered that "misbehavior".

Public school playgrounds are supervised, at best, with an adult per class. More likely you've got 2 adults with 100 kindergarteners. It's easy to imagine a kid walking off a playground, an adult seeing him, heading towards him, but he's turned a corner before the adult gets to him. That's probably what happened here, given that they noticed, called police, and provided a description that allowed a police officer to find him before the kid got 1/4 mile.

That's not appalling incompetence on the part of adults. If you think that kindergarteners should be in fenced playgrounds, then advocate for that. Or advocate for different staffing ratios. But recognize that with current (non-covid) staff ratios and playground set ups, this can happen.

You’re nuts. Yes it’s possible there is a behavioral or other issue with this child but he is FIVE and the adults failed completely. By your logic a preschool teacher could have an open bottle of antifreeze out and if a child drank it it would be primarily a behavior issue. That’s crazy and you are clearly in the minority.

No, people are saying that we need to hear and see both sides, especially the video before jumping to conclusions. But there is more going on with that child/family as 5 year olds don't just leave school.

Again, separate from police I look forward to hearing the rebuttal to the controversial “five year olds shouldn’t be allowed to leave school on a walkabout” take.

Teachers are not allowed to restrain/stop students but this doesn't make a lot of sense.

[Anonymous]

The nice thing about DL, this non-sense doesn't happen.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'd like to see the body cam as you are just getting the parents side who was not there. That kid needs a SN child care setting if they are eloping. There is far more to this story.

he didn’t elope, he wandered off. He was literally 1 minute from school.

He is 5.

T
You are an example of somebody so set on defending cops that your brain has fallen out of your skull.

He eloped. He went away from his child care providers. You aren't hearing the other side of the story and hearing from parents who instantly think lets sue. If anything the issue is with the child care providers who didn't properly supervise him.

You sound insane.

No need to name call but there is more to this story. Kids don't just leave school property, which is eloping, if something more isn't going on. Either this kid had SN or something bad was happening at school.

No. There is not.

They told him he needed to be beaten 20 times. He is 5. That alone is a case.

All your musing is irrelevant... if you think it is relevant, again you are insane.

Oh okay if he is SN it’s okay to yell in his face and tell him 20 times he should be beaten, that is even worse... case closed and bye bye cops in schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'd like to see the body cam as you are just getting the parents side who was not there. That kid needs a SN child care setting if they are eloping. There is far more to this story.

he didn’t elope, he wandered off. He was literally 1 minute from school.

He is 5.

T
You are an example of somebody so set on defending cops that your brain has fallen out of your skull.

He eloped. He went away from his child care providers. You aren't hearing the other side of the story and hearing from parents who instantly think lets sue. If anything the issue is with the child care providers who didn't properly supervise him.

You sound insane.

No need to name call but there is more to this story. Kids don't just leave school property, which is eloping, if something more isn't going on. Either this kid had SN or something bad was happening at school.

No. There is not.

They told him he needed to be beaten 20 times. He is 5. That alone is a case.

All your musing is irrelevant... if you think it is relevant, again you are insane.

Oh okay if he is SN it’s okay to yell in his face and tell him 20 times he should be beaten, that is even worse... case closed and bye bye cops in schools.

We need police in schools sadly. We also need to see the footage. Kids don't leave school typically so there is more to this story.

[Anonymous]

My son was in a 1st grade class with a boy who would regularly walk out of class and yell at the teacher she couldn’t touch him as he kicked her shins and threw things at her. He thought it was funny to hide after recess so the teacher and playground aides had to go looking for him. He was a really smart but incredibly defiant kid and he sucked up half of the teacher’s time. His mother would blame everyone for not understanding her spirited child and complained about poor supervision. She was talking to someone at pickup and her child approached her and gave her his backpack. The mom kept talking and the boy took off. She couldn’t find him and loudly blamed the school for losing him. She posted on social media about the poor supervision but left out the fact she was at the school and he should have been under her supervision. My son learned very little that year. And neither did his classmates.

[Anonymous]

I wrote out a whole long thing as an ESS parent, and then deleted it, because I don't want to share a bunch of info or engage in too much speculation. Bottom line to me is that the cops look terrible here, and the school's involvement is at least more ambiguous, possibly open to interpretation and hard to know the degree of. Could be very bad, could be much less so. I, for one, would like to know.

That said, I want to know what the dynamic is here. Assuming the boy is African American-- regardless of the race of the cops, black boys' behavior is criminalized by *everyone*. This story is deeply disturbing to me. The child was FIVE. I'll also say that those of you assuming money grubbing and lying on the part of the mom are gross to me, and yes, there is a racialized and/or class-based element to that. Cut it out.

[Anonymous]

Yikes. SRO’s are human and make the same mistakes as the rest of us. This kid must have resisted in every way possible, leaving the officer few options. But obviously he lost his cool and should know better. The kid belongs in a locked facility though.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'd like to see the body cam as you are just getting the parents side who was not there. That kid needs a SN child care setting if they are eloping. There is far more to this story.

he didn’t elope, he wandered off. He was literally 1 minute from school.

He is 5.

T
You are an example of somebody so set on defending cops that your brain has fallen out of your skull.

He eloped. He went away from his child care providers. You aren't hearing the other side of the story and hearing from parents who instantly think lets sue. If anything the issue is with the child care providers who didn't properly supervise him.

You sound insane.

No need to name call but there is more to this story. Kids don't just leave school property, which is eloping, if something more isn't going on. Either this kid had SN or something bad was happening at school.

No. There is not.

They told him he needed to be beaten 20 times. He is 5. That alone is a case.

All your musing is irrelevant... if you think it is relevant, again you are insane.

Oh okay if he is SN it’s okay to yell in his face and tell him 20 times he should be beaten, that is even worse... case closed and bye bye cops in schools.

We need police in schools sadly. We also need to see the footage. Kids don't leave school typically so there is more to this story.

When you're a hammer, everything looks like a nail, I guess.

When people talk about defunding the police, they mostly mean: give most of the money to programs and professionals who can address these sorts of situations while NOT carrying guns (and often looking for fights, and seeing everyone as a combatant).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Yikes. SRO’s are human and make the same mistakes as the rest of us. This kid must have resisted in every way possible, leaving the officer few options. But obviously he lost his cool and should know better. The kid belongs in a locked facility though.

They weren't SROs and you're disgusting. Just assuming no cop would ever use excessive force. Kid must have deserved it. Guess you've learned nothing from the videos we've all seen. I wasn't there, so I can't say what happened. But neither are you. At least I have Occam's Razor on my side.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Separate from the police I can’t believe people are focusing on the five year old leaving rather than the grown adults not supervising him well enough (this making it possible for all of this to happen.) if this happened with your child snd a babysitter would you be focused on the “misbehavior” or the appalling incompetence of the adult?

By age 5, my kids were playing on unfenced playgrounds, or playgrounds with gaps in fencing (this includes every public school playground in my area) without me watching them every second, with me, with babysitters, and at school. They were never there alone. There was always an adult close enough to hear them if they called for help, but that adult might be monitoring other children. If my kid walked off the playground while I was pushing his toddler sibling in the swing, I would absolutely have considered that "misbehavior".

Public school playgrounds are supervised, at best, with an adult per class. More likely you've got 2 adults with 100 kindergarteners. It's easy to imagine a kid walking off a playground, an adult seeing him, heading towards him, but he's turned a corner before the adult gets to him. That's probably what happened here, given that they noticed, called police, and provided a description that allowed a police officer to find him before the kid got 1/4 mile.

That's not appalling incompetence on the part of adults. If you think that kindergarteners should be in fenced playgrounds, then advocate for that. Or advocate for different staffing ratios. But recognize that with current (non-covid) staff ratios and playground set ups, this can happen.

You’re nuts. Yes it’s possible there is a behavioral or other issue with this child but he is FIVE and the adults failed completely. By your logic a preschool teacher could have an open bottle of antifreeze out and if a child drank it it would be primarily a behavior issue. That’s crazy and you are clearly in the minority.

No, people are saying that we need to hear and see both sides, especially the video before jumping to conclusions. But there is more going on with that child/family as 5 year olds don't just leave school.

Again, separate from police I look forward to hearing the rebuttal to the controversial “five year olds shouldn’t be allowed to leave school on a walkabout” take.

Teachers are not allowed to restrain/stop students but this doesn't make a lot of sense.

I like this image of a juggernaut of a five year old who can’t be stopped by multiple grown adults and multiple doors. Guess it was unavoidable.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'd like to see the body cam as you are just getting the parents side who was not there. That kid needs a SN child care setting if they are eloping. There is far more to this story.

he didn’t elope, he wandered off. He was literally 1 minute from school.

He is 5.

T
You are an example of somebody so set on defending cops that your brain has fallen out of your skull.

He eloped. He went away from his child care providers. You aren't hearing the other side of the story and hearing from parents who instantly think lets sue. If anything the issue is with the child care providers who didn't properly supervise him.

You sound insane.

No need to name call but there is more to this story. Kids don't just leave school property, which is eloping, if something more isn't going on. Either this kid had SN or something bad was happening at school.

No. There is not.

They told him he needed to be beaten 20 times. He is 5. That alone is a case.

All your musing is irrelevant... if you think it is relevant, again you are insane.

Oh okay if he is SN it’s okay to yell in his face and tell him 20 times he should be beaten, that is even worse... case closed and bye bye cops in schools.

We need police in schools sadly. We also need to see the footage. Kids don't leave school typically so there is more to this story.

I am not sure what more is needed to be known about this story. The school has a duty of care. Accepting your argument that this was a bad kid does not absolve the school of their duty. The school breached their duty by failing to keep this kid on school grounds and failing to account for his whereabouts.

Calling the police to assist in the search was the right move, but the behavior of the police officers as detailed in the complaint based on the body camera footage likely constitutes intentional infliction of emotion distress. In view of the minor status of the child, the fact these are LEOs, the kids age and expected level of development, it is difficult to imagine any possible mitigants in favor of the officers if the behavior is faithfully presented in the complaint related to the emotional abuse. On the other hand, the officers will likely have easy defenses to the complaint regarding physical force - at least to restrain the child and bring it back to school. All of the other behavior presented, e.g. the screaming, handcuffing, threats, would be outside of police protocols and training.

MCPS officials at the school witnessing and even encouraging these police behaviors would again violate their duty of care.

You keep alluding to another side of the story, but it is not necessary under the law. All you have to do is analyze the facts in the light most favorable to the defendant to see that there is a case here and that is why this will settle very, very quickly.