Two special education educators were busted for beating their non-verbal, special needs middle school students after a third, disgusted teacher planted a hidden camera to record the horrendous abuse.
“Ms. J.” reverted to filming the classroom after the principal and district administrators refused to investigate her claims that the teachers would slap, choke and body slam students who had no voice of their own to tell of the horrific conduct.
“I haven’t been the same. I haven’t been able to return to the work environment,” the emotional, anonymous “Ms. J.” told WXIA-TV.
The teacher eventually forked over just four days of footage, which showed Alger Coleman and Keisha Smith berate and beat the students. Coleman was arrested and charged with battery and child cruelty, though cops had to barge their way into the man’s house to make the collar, the TV station reported.
Smith has not been criminally charged, but the Atlanta Public School district pulled her from Harper Archer Middle School as she awaits a disciplinary hearing.
One segment of the video shows Coleman smack a boy in the head after he spilled some water, slapping the child right out of his chair. After the boy gets back up, he’s put in a vicious chokehold from behind, then slapped again.
“Bam! Clearly slaps him totally out of the chair,” the anonymous teacher’s attorney, Terance Mitchell, told WXIA as he watched the footage.
A second shows Smith hold a boy’s limp body by the arm as she repeatedly hits on his head with an open hand.
“Ms. J” told the TV station that Coleman, a behavior specialist, and Smith, a paraprofessional, at first were just unprofessional, watching TV and listening to music and not paying any attention to the students.
The pair eventually devolved into verbal and physical abuse, the whistleblower said. Coleman has since been fired.
Even parents were left in the dark. Sherry Cheely, the mother of an 11-year-old boy shown battered and beaten by Smith in the video, said it wasn’t until the state Department of Family and Children Services contacted her, not the school district, that she knew anything was happening at school.
“It was just outrageous. It was heartbreaking when I saw the video,” the distressed mom told WXIA. “It’s really hard because I can’t trust no one, pretty much. And I feel like I was let down by the public school system, they failed me.”
