Residents in Lancaster, California, are outraged after a video surfaced of a school resource officer body-slamming a Black teen girl.
On Wednesday, a student manhandled by a school resource officer with the Los Angeles Police Department stood next to her mother, fellow students, and civil rights attorney Lisa Bloom during a news conference to discuss the incident that has caused a community uproar.
Two weeks ago, a video captured a teen girl being body-slammed and then pinned down to the floor by an officer. The student says the entire ordeal started when she approached the officer and asked why he was looking at her in a certain way. She also asked him if everything was okay with him.
After their scuffle, eventually, the officer detained the girl and removed her from the premises, ABC 7 reports. The sheriff’s office claims the student used inappropriate language. “My client says she didn’t use any foul language; it was her friend. At any rate, the foul language was not a threat,” said Bloom.
“What we have heard from the sheriff’s department is that my client was a ‘threat.’ What was the ‘threat’? We haven’t been told specifically,” Bloom said during the conference. Bloom said the girl tried to walk away from the officer, but the officer demanded her to stay there.
“The sheriff’s deputy says she was walking away from him, and that’s why he had to take her down. That is not a justification to take down a child. It is not a justification to take down an adult,” Bloom said.
In the meantime, Bloom said she is looking at all the options for the student. The school district issued a statement, saying: “The District, in conjunction with the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department, is reviewing the incident. The District and Sheriff Department have a shared commitment to ensure the safety of all our students at all our schools.”
