A three-year-old Missouri girl is recovering from head injuries after she was hurled against a cabinet by a woman at the child’s day care center.
Relatives of the girl say they were initially told she was hurt in a fall, but surveillance video showed a worker pulling the girl out of her seat and throwing her up against a cabinet. ABC 13 reports that the incident happened on Feb. 1 at the Brighter Day Care and Preschool in St. Louis County. The girl received seven stitches to close a gaping split in her head and was in the hospital for three days.
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According to ABC 13, the family’s attorney was left in the dark about what really happened until five days later when they watched surveillance video with the day care director. The worker was immediately fired. Now, police and state child care workers are investigating.
An attorney for the day care’s director, Sharon Williams told ABC 13 News that teachers and staff at the school are sufficiently trained, and that the center works hard to provide a safe environment for the children.
Initially, the daycare worker sent an “unintentional injury form” home to the girl’s parents that read “Bump her head, when she fall out on carpet,” reported Newsweek. When the parents didn’t believe the story and requested to see the tape, apparently Williams watched it along with them and learned that day as well what really happened.
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“In no world did this family have any idea that what was called a fall was actually an assault until they came to see that video,” said Jennifer Hansen, the family’s attorney, according to Parents.
After seeing what really happened on the video, the daycare fired the employee. The police are now investigating the incident along with state child care inspectors.
“One of the more egregious aspects of this case is that the daycare director told the family that she did not watch the surveillance tape until the family was with her. The daycare could’ve reviewed that footage at any time. They didn’t and they allowed the day care worker who assaulted this little girl, to continue to work at the facility for five additional days,” said Hansen.
The local FOX affiliate reported that this was far from the first disturbing event to occur at this daycare. State inspectors discovered a second child had sustained puncture wounds to the skin during another incident at the school.
In May 2018, inspectors concluded that a third teacher “slammed a child down on the cot” and that a third grade teacher was “holding a child by his wrist, dragging him across the room.”
In June 2016, inspectors said, “staff did not have a preventative plan in place” when “(one child was) repeatedly hitting and choking another child.” And in March 2016, inspectors wrote that a “child fell out of the chair and sustained a left femoral fracture.”
