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Video shows 7-year-old Miami boy in handcuffs after he allegedly attacked teacher

January 30, 2018 by  
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A 7-year-old Miami boy was taken into custody last week after police say he attacked a teacher at school by pulling her hair and repeatedly punching her in the back.

It was the child’s second tantrum in less than three months, his family said. But this time, a Miami-Dade Schools Police officer went an extra step: The boy was handcuffed, loaded into a cruiser and taken to a psychiatric evaluation as permitted under state law. Part of the incident was caught on video and continued to be shared Friday on Facebook.

“I know my kid did wrong, and he will be punished for what he did,” the boy’s father, Rolando Fuentes, told NBC Miami. “But what the police officer did afterward, this is out of hand. Unbelievable.”

Image: 7-year-old in handcuffs


Image: 7-year-old in handcuffs

While the image of young children in cuffs can stir outrage and has also led to lawsuits in recent years, this latest occurrence is raising questions about what the appropriate response is when a minor acts out.

Law enforcement officers often deal with making quick decisions with little information and under dangerous circumstances, said Martha Lenderman, a former mental health administrator who helped write the Baker Act, Florida’s law that allows for people to be hospitalized for psychiatric evaluation.

“That’s a pretty tough thing,” she added.

The 7-year-old in the Miami case is not being identified because he is a juvenile. According to a school police report, the child was upset at his teacher at the Coral Way K-8 Center for being told not to play with his food.

Related: Why handcuff a student with a disability?

The boy “attacked the teacher by repeatedly punching her on the back” while she was in the hallways talking to another teacher about his behavior, the report said.

The teacher restrained the boy, but he continued to hit her, and the two ended up falling to the ground, the school report said.

Surveillance cameras captured the incident, although the video was not immediately made public. The report said the boy’s parents were contacted, and while his mother didn’t want him to be treated under the Baker Act, his father agreed. (He told NBC Miami he had to consent or his son would be arrested.)

The unidentified teacher also said she wanted to press charges, according to the report.

Image: Rolando Fuentes


Image: Rolando Fuentes

The boy was previously suspended in November for 10 days for his bad temper, his mother said.

Miami-Dade Schools Police said in a statement that such an incident is rare, but the boy’s violent outburst required his handcuffing in order to prevent him “from bringing further harm to others or himself. The manner in which he was transported to the receiving facility was done in accordance with Standard Operating Procedures.”

Lenderman said that while handcuffing a child may have “horrifying optics,” police officers have to be motivated to ensure that both the child and those around him are safe.

However, Florida’s law allowing for someone to be involuntarily hospitalized for up to 72 hours adds an extra layer of judgment.

Related: Police apologize for handcuffing 7-year-old in Michigan

The Miami boy’s family denied he had a “mental disorder” and said he was actually the victim of bullying.

“Sometimes officers responding to the scene don’t know all the information,” Lenderman said. “If what the teacher is saying is corroborated with video, then it appears to be a fairly not unreasonable decision on the part of the officer” to handcuff the child.

Being handcuffed and placed into a police car “can be very scary for any person, including a young child,” added Dr. Lisa Spector, who specializes in developmental-behavioral pediatrics at Nemours Children’s Hospital in Florida.

Any child who is bullied or acts out toward others can benefit from a psychological evaluation, she added, and believes schools need to have services available where adults can identify trauma in children early on and help them cope with their problems, potentially preventing violent behavior.



Otherwise, “it can set up a lot of distrust and additional stress between the teacher and the child,” Spector said.

Lenderman predicts the rates of young children being admitted for psychological evaluation will likely increase with more reported cases of bullying, suicide and schools heightened with concerns about safety.

“People still feel shame because there can be a stigma with mental illness, but that needs to change,” she added.

A 2017 report on the Baker Act through the University of South Florida found that 32,000 children were examined under the law in fiscal year 2015-16 — a nearly 50 percent increase statewide from five years earlier.

The Miami boy was released hours after being brought to a children’s hospital. His family couldn’t immediately be reached for comment Monday.

Fuentes, the boy’s father, said he just can’t believe his son was treated in such a manner.

“There’s something wrong in this case,” he added.

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Trump Jr. Hits At Hillary Clinton’s ‘Fire And Fury’ Grammy Cameo

January 30, 2018 by  
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Sunday night’s Grammy Awards dove less into politics and activism compared to the Golden Globes earlier this month, but in one pre-taped skit, the show plunged right into the, well, fire and fury.

2017 Grammy Awards: Adele Upsets Beyonc, Chance Arrives, Politics Pop (Slightly)

Host James Corden reminded the audience that you don’t need to be a musician to win a Grammy – the award for Best Spoken Word Album has gone to books written by a number of politicians like Barack Obama and Bill Clinton.

“We know that our current president does love winning awards, and the good news for him is he may just be the subject of next year’s winner,” Corden went on, as The Washington Post reports. “The question I’ve got is: Who will be the narrator?”

Enter the star-studded pre-taped sketch, with John Legend, Cher, Snoop Dogg, Cardi B and DJ Khaled each reading passages from Fire and Fury, Michael Wolff’s dishy – and disputed — book on the Trump White House.

'People Regret What They Said To Me,' Michael Wolff Tells NPR About Trump Book

“If Trump was not having his 6:30 dinner with Steve Bannon, then more to his liking he was in bed by that time with a cheeseburger,” reads Cardi B. She looks up at the camera and says “why am I even reading this … I can’t believe this. … This how he lives his life?”

The last reader is the skit’s pièce de résistance: the unmistakable hairstyle and sensible outfit of a certain spoken-word Grammy winner.

Hillary Clinton begins to read, to cheers and applause from the audience: “He had a long-time fear of being poisoned, one reason why he liked to eat at McDonald’s. Nobody knew he was coming, and the food was safely pre-made.”

Corden bursts into the frame. “That’s it, we’ve got it, that’s the one!”

“You think so?” Clinton asks. “The Grammy’s in the bag?”

“In the bag,” he says.

Nikki Haley, Trump’s ambassador to the United Nations, was unimpressed.

“I have always loved the Grammys but to have artists read the Fire and Fury book killed it. Don’t ruin great music with trash. Some of us love music without the politics thrown in it,” she tweeted.

Donald Trump Jr., on the other hand, seemed to relish the moment.

“Getting to read a #fakenews book excerpt at the Grammys seems like a great consolation prize for losing the presidency,” he tweeted.

Trump Jr. also tweeted: “The more Hillary goes on television the more the American people realize how awesome it is to have @realDonaldTrump in office #GrammyAwards2018.”

All politics aside, there was a noteworthy winner of this year’s Best Spoken Word Album: the late Carrie Fisher, for her memoir The Princess Diarist.

Carrie Fisher Opens Up About 'Star Wars,' The Gold Bikini And Her On-Set Affair

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