Misbehaving in school earned one young girl a trip to the station in handcuffs.
Elementary school student Jmyha Rickman, an autistic eight-year-old from Alton, Ill., had her wrists and feet cuffed and was taken away in the back of a police car late Tuesday morning after throwing a tantrum, reports St. Louis’ KMOV.
School officials called the Alton, Ill. police to intervene during what was apparently a bad tantrum at Lovejoy Elementary School. Nehemiah Keeton, Rickman’s guardian, said the cops treated the 70-pound girl like a criminal.
“Her eyes were swollen from her crying and her wrists had welts on them,” Keeton told KMOV. “They cuffed her feet too, and she asked to use the restroom several times and was ignored.”
“I feel like if you can’t handle an 8-year-old child without calling the police to put fear in them like my child, you don’t need to work with kids. I trusted the school to give her the adequate treatment and care she deserves, and they failed us,” Keeton told KSDK News.
Rickman’s requests to use the bathroom were ignored, Keeton said.
Alton police told KMOV that they were answering a call regarding an out of control child who was tearing up two classrooms. Police also clarified that Rickman was put in a supervised juvenile detention room at the police station. An officer says he thinks the appropriate actions were taken, according to KMOV.
Source: NY Daily News; IBT
