Another story about the aspie and the cop.

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I just heard this story on the news a few minutes ago. Not far from where I live, a 3rd grade student, who has Asperger's, was becoming violent and was having small outbursts in the classroom. (nothing that couldn't have been handled) The cops were called and the kid was handcuffed to the chair, and was later hauled away in the squad car.


Traumatizing.

That's sick. Even in the 21st Century, people on the Spectrum are still being treated like animals.

This happens fairly frequently, and it's not limited to aspies. The issue is that schools don't have a whole lot of authority to deal with physically disruptive children. They're not law enforcement agents; teachers and staff just aren't trained or authorized to deal with that in a safe way.

What are they supposed to do with a struggling and violent kid? Bodily hold him down until the parents arrive and carry the kid away, maybe hours later? That's not realistic, and it wouldn't be safe...what if someone gets hurt? Better to let the police deal with it. And, while it may seem extreme, handcuffs are the best way to stop the child from causing harm to himself or others.

You have to look at each incident on a case by case basis. I saw a video of a similar incident a few months ago, and the girl in that case was being physically violent and threatening school employees. The police gave her every opportunity to calm down, and warned her what would happen if she didn't. They used the minimum amount of force to get her restrained, and I think they acted as professionally as possible under the circumstances.

I don't know what happened in this case. It's possible there was some kind of overreaction, but the fact that the police arrived and restrained a child shouldn't automatically be reason to think something terrible happened.

Jeremy

Yeah, and that's the sort of f**ked-up society liberal-type politicians have made in the UK, too. When I was a kid, if someone had behaved like that, one of the larger rugby-playing teachers would have been summoned and he'd have used reasonable force to restrain the kid. That is realistic; how realistic and proportionate is it to call the cops just in case "someone gets hurt"? — it's absolutely crazy. Though, I concede much of the society you and I live in is crazy, and to that extent I suppose we have to accept such bizarre behaviour, for now.

having been a former teacher, I can tell you with almost absolute certanity that the school had no support fro dicipline from the parents and they resorted to the next step.

If you punish a child, say for an inapproprate outburst, most of the time the parents call the principal and curse and yell and demand you recind the punishment because "little johnny" is not to blaim for his behavior, its becaue he (fill in the blank).

Some principals are even threatened with law suits and teachers are penanized for administering punishments when a parent calls. Im not even talking about corpral punishment, Im talking about loosing resess or being sent to the office. Real minor punishments. Many schools have officers on campus to keep the crime down, and they, by default, are often called by schools too afraid to stand up to parents when a kid gets out of hand.

I had to, once, write a long letter to a parent describing why the word that starts with a "B" and means "with out a father" was inapproprate, and profane. her son could have been suspended for shouting that in my classroom but I geve him a day of lunch detention (no recess and eating lunch with the coach in silence). A letter describing why it was not allowed, I was accused of being a "rasist" because the same child later wrote and passed around FILTHY song lyrics during a standardized test. After taking up the filth (and it was the nastiest thing I have ever read and thats saying something) I explained to him that it was not approprate to pass things like that around especally during the PACT test. He became irate and threatened to beat the S*&# out of me. Im 5'2" this kid was pushing 6 feet tall. I told him he wouldnt try but once. I marched him to the principals office and he proceeded to shout that he was in trouble because of his ethnic background. several other teachers saw this occor and had notified the officer who, then, came in and was present for the rest of the yelling match. the kid got 10 days Out of school suspention, not for threating me, but for the filth that he wrote. The rest of the year I had problems with him, showing out and acusing me of being a rasist for calling him down for disrupting thte class. His friends in other classses also joined in. I was a equal oppunertiy punisher. if you broke the rules, you recieved the punishment as written in the student handbook. peroid. parents rarely complained. One got mad and demanded her son be "removed from my class' because he used a slur and I wrote him up for it. I didnt tolerate the crap. The principal put me on the phone with her and she proceeded to cuss and berate me for punishing her child. I told her he had been warned before, and I was not recending the punishment.

Teachers are scared of litigation. many schools donot back their teachers decistions to follow through with punishment. Other schools have, because of this and other factors, a no tollerance policy for disruptions. They call the police, or get the resource officer on campus to take the kid home. I do not agree with handcuffing a kid to a desk, aspergers or not. Calling the officer in for a disruption in a lower grade is questionable. If the child posed a physical threat and could not be handled, then the guidence counclers or principal should have been the ones to handle it. The older kids (regular ed) that are more threatining, and that the normal means of handing them have not worked might have to be reffered to law enforcement. I saw that in high school.

AS far as a teacher restraining a child physically, well, its a legal nightmare. some BD teachers have the authority to hold a kid if they are a danger to self or others. I worked as a sub for several months with the BD kids grades K-2. We had a few that were so viloent that we HAD to "basket" hold them until they were too tired to fight. We were bitten, kicked hit and head butted. but if allowed to continue in a fit unrestrained these kids threw tables and chairs and attacked other children. these kids had SERIOUS nurological issues, and were often medicated with anti-psycotic drugs. the older kids in these type classes have teachers and aids that come with a pair of big, strong, trained men to restrain them if they have a "chair throwing fit". We called them, in jest, the BD bouncers. I could talk to many of these kids in my class, IF I caught the signs of a meltdown early and calm them down. but some, there were no signs, they just snapped. The worst part was that the parents, often drug addicts hence the kids neuro issues, forgot to medicate them or decided to buy smokes with the kids med money and then blaimed the kid for the problems. its a sad and touchy situation.

ladysmokeater, fancy running into you, here.

I saw that story. it was a little african american Boy. Who just wanted his candy, or similar.
But i didn't get the impression that the story was that concerned with his disability.
I got the impression that they were playing up the race card.

Nonetheless, you shouldn't handcuff a first grader, for having a tempertantrum.

It could have been handled with more dignity if they would have pinned him to the ground with a grapple gold of a greco roman wrestler.

Was that last line sarcastic? .... I never can tell for sure online.

Yea, handcuffing the tike was not good. If he was a danger to him self or others then properly restraining him would have been an unfortunate nessisaty.....

*sigh* kids these days.....

Yeah, it was a lame attempt at showing how un dignified the situation was.


I don't remember the kiddo being a threat to himself.

And you could only imagine what kind of threat a first grader would be for two adult white males.

i think they were being lazy

if that child was throwing things in the classroom or creating a physical disruption, then he was a danger to others, and perhaps depending on the severity, him self.

Race isnt a factor. If the ethnic background of the cops was the same as the kid would it have mattered then?

Im not saying that calling the police in a situation like that was right, but we do not have all the factors. Had this kid done this before and the parents threatened to sue if the teacher tried to restrain him? What were the schools policies and procedures? How bad was the disruption? What prompted the police to be called rather than the principal? there are many factors. But I can say from experience, that if a child is a danger to self or others, he/she has to be isolated and restrained. Restrain doesnt mean hand cuffs, it usually means the teacher holding the child in a "basket hold" till the kid calms down. I can also say that the chair that hits you in the shin from a kid throwing it from across the room hurts just as bad as it would had the kid been older, except perhaps the bigger kid could get more distance on it.

Also consider the source.

I think i saw it on one of those yellow journalism news shows.

I wasn't watching i swear, it was background noise to tune out the white noise.

Being on the other side of the table, ie having had a son cuffed and arrested, I think this is a large assumption.

In our case, our 12 year old son was having a melt down. He got over it and was waiting in the front office area for school to be over. I was told not to come and get him because the school could handle it. The principal came in, didn't bother to find out what was going on, and ordered him back into the classroom. My son refused knowing that to go back prematurely would cause another meltdown. His IEP also allows him to wait them out. The principal said some other kids heard the refusal and to make sure his authority wasn't questioned by them, he (the principal) called the school cop to "help" my son back to class. My son, knowing full well his IEP says he can sit in the office if not up to class, refused. The officer tried to force him up and my son resisted. He was cuffed and arrested. He couldn't see us for two hours as he was being booked. We are waiting to see if he is charged with a misorminor or a felony.

Teachers, administrators and parents, for the most part, want what is best for the student but sometimes accidents are made by people in any one of those groups. Maybe from your point of view its usually parents. I see, and hear from other parents in my district, that errors happen all around.

I question the legality of using a police officer to move someone who wasn't braking any laws but that's another post for some other day.

BeeBee

How is your son as a result of this.

Did you get a written letter of apology from the principle?

And all you Americans bang on about freedom! Jeez... and you do that to 12 year olds with ASDs?

Thank you for asking SB2.

No, the principal insists he needs to treat all students the same. When he says go, they should go. The director of special ed disagrees with him and we will have meetings on this. This is the Principal's first year as a principal so I think he's still learning his job too.

D was extremely upset and had nighly nightmare for about a week. Now he's just up until 2AM worring about school. The teachers and councilors have been really supporting him there to an unbelievable degree. I think he will be ok. If not, I'm seirously looking at homeschooling although I work outside the home and am not sure I would be good at it.

I'm not sure what going though the judicual system will do to him. We need to see what he is charged with first. We were told it would be distribing the peace or, if the officer had bruised from where D hit at him while trying to get away, assult of a police officer. His lawyer seems very good and calming so I guess we just wait.

My son's laywer feels the officer acted outside his legal scope, ie acted illegally. The schools own attorney has said the officers may not be used to implement school policy which was what happened.

The officer in the school is also a new program. I don't think anyone knew what they were doing. I tried to get this situation clearified last year when the program started. I asked what training the officers needed with juviniles and with mental illness or disiese or nuero differances. When they could interceed and how.

My top priority is to take care of my son. A secondary one is to fight to clarifiy the rules and training so this doesn't happen again.

BeeBee

Neither kids nor parents should be put through that, unless something really bad has been done.