A black Georgia teenager had to have his leg amputated five weeks after a behavioral specialist working at his school allegedly threw him to the floor several times and then denied him medical treatment, the Ledger-Enquirer reports.
As Raw Story reports, the 13-year-old, identified as Montravious Thomas, underwent amputation Tuesday.
Montravious was allegedly body-slammed repeatedly by behavioral specialist Bryant Mosley on Sept. 12 at an alternative school in Muscogee County, Ga. Montravious was enrolled in an alternative program, known by the acronym AIM, after being temporarily removed from East Columbus Middle School for unspecified violations of behavior rules, Raw Story reports.
Attorney Renee Tucker, representing Montravious and his mother, said that the family learned about the need for the amputation last weekend.
“As anyone can anticipate, there was certainly an emotional response,” Tucker told the Ledger-Enquirer, adding that the teen will probably need counseling as well as physical therapy. “I mean, the fact that now it’s led to an amputation just signifies the degree of force that was used with regard to our client, particularly [the school employee] body-slamming him three different times.”
Tucker said the boy's mother also lost her job at a temporary agency because she had to spend so much time by her child's side.
“As anyone can anticipate, it’s not the fault of any employer,” Tucker said. “But when you’re an employee and you’re not able to make it to work, you’re not able to maintain a position.”
The alleged incident started when the student tried to leave the classroom to go to the main office to call his mother to pick him up. According to Tucker, it was at that point that the school employee stopped him for an unknown reason and slammed him to the floor. The student said that he was tossed down to the floor a second time when he again tried to leave.
Tucker said it is not quite clear how many times the child was body-slammed, but said that Assistant Principal Eddie Powell witnessed the encounter at some point. Tucker also said that a school resource officer saw the boy limping but did not assist or file a report.
“I don’t think there’s any explanation that a teacher can give as to why he didn’t want him to go to the administrative office to call his mother,” she said.
According to the attorney, school officials told the boy that they would call an ambulance but the officials decided not to later on.
The specialist instead put the student on his bus and sent him home without notifying the family about the injury, according to the report.
“They placed an injured student on the school bus,” said Tucker, adding that the boy told officials that his leg was numb on Oct. 13. “We don’t know the extent that the injuries were worsened by the failure to render aid and certainly by picking him up and seating him on the school bus. Then they had him ride in that same school bus home without any support or stabilization of that leg.”
Tucker said that an "inside source" told her that the school had video footage of the incident and that she has submitted an open-records request to the Muscogee County Schools' board, requesting the footage and more than 50 other documents.
The attorney has not yet gotten the documents requested, but she said she has notified the Muscogee County School District that the boy and his family intend to file a $5 million lawsuit.
A school district spokesperson offered "thoughts and prayers" to the student.
“We are committed to conducting a thorough review of the alleged incident at the AIM Student Services Center to determine all of the facts," the spokesperson said.
Read more at the Ledger-Inquirer and Raw Story.