Cruel daycare worker caught on camera hurling shoe at 5-year-old special needs girl
The girl was at the Destiny Development Center in Inglewood on Jan. 16, where surveillance video shows a woman taking off her shoe and chucking it at the child, who cries after being hit. KTLA
A daycare worker was caught on camera throwing a shoe at a 5-year-old girl with special needs at a Los Angeles-area childcare center — and now the child’s mother is demanding answers.
The incident happened Jan. 16 at the Destiny Development Center in Inglewood. Surveillance video reportedly shows an employee removing her shoe and tossing it toward the child, who began crying after being struck. Two other staff members were present and appeared to laugh during the incident.
The girl’s mother, Michelae Jones, told KTLA she was shocked to learn what had happened.
“I’ve been with these people for three years,” Jones said. “I really thought my baby was safe with them.”
Jones said her daughter told her about the incident, which prompted her to contact the daycare center’s director. She said the response from staff was slow, and she was not allowed to view the surveillance footage for more than two weeks.
The girl’s aunt, Kira Townsend, questioned the center’s safety procedures and oversight.
“How do you have a business and you don’t review the footage unless a parent says something?” Townsend told KTLA. “Why do we have to wait for my niece to come and tell us, ‘Hey, my teacher hit me in the ear with a shoe?’”
The daycare center’s director, Danielle Williams, initially told Jones she was looking into the matter. According to KTLA, Williams later said the caregiver had been “throwing shoes into another room” and that the child was accidentally struck.
“My school, what we stand for, it’s not child abuse,” Williams said. “We don’t hire child abusers.”
Williams said the employee who threw the shoe, identified only as “Ms. Emily,” was fired, along with two other staff members who did not report the incident.
Jones, however, fears the situation may not have been isolated and is calling for the worker to face criminal charges for assault and child abuse.
“You need to be in jail like any other child abuser,” she told KTLA. “That’s what I want. Justice.”
The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department is investigating the case.
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