School officials are investigating after video surfaced online last week showing a district police officer slamming a 12-year-old middle school student face down to the ground.
Footage of the incident appears to show a uniformed San Antonio schools police officer walking a girl with her hands behind her back before abruptly turning and flipping the girl over his arm. She lands face down and other students can be heard shouting “are you OK?”
The San Antonio Express-News reported the officer, identified as Joshua Kehm, intervened in a verbal dispute between two female students outside of Rhodes Middle School around 4 p.m. on March 29.
Kehm is on paid leave administrative leave after the incident. The 6th grader’s mother, Gloria Valdez, told the newspaper her daughter was suspended from school for two days.
Valdez also said her daughter was knocked unconscious after hitting the cement.
“Supposedly, he was threatened by her that she kicked him, but in the video her legs never went up,” she told KENS. “All he had to is grab her and put her to the side.”
A San Antonio Independent School District spokeswoman said officials were alerted to the video on Tuesday. She called it “alarming” and said the district is investigating the events that led up to the confrontation.
Watch the video via YouTube user Ghost-0:
