School Principal In Trouble After Having 5-Year-Old Handcuff

[sunny]

School Principal In Trouble After Having 5-Year-Old Handcuffed

http://treets.ktvu.com/svc/lnk.cfm?l=45618367&t=1 ^


Posted on 12/16/2004 10:07:18 AM PST by Ellesu


ST. LOUIS -- The board of a St. Louis charter school on Wednesday placed a principal on leave after he had police handcuff a 5-year-old and drive him around the block in a squad car to curb his unruly behavior.

Principal Sam Morgan is on leave from Thurgood Marshall Academy pending an investigation into last month's incident, board attorney Wayne Harvey said.

Morgan declined to comment Wednesday, but last week said he had spent more time on the boy "than any kid in this building, trying to steer him straight."

He said he had police "put the handcuffs on one arm, put him in the back seat of their car and drive him around a little bit."

Morgan added: "This kid is heading for the Department of Corrections at 5. He fights, strikes somebody practically every day on the bus. He's a constant disruption."

Morgan, a longtime principal at East St. Louis High School in Illinois, also spent eight years working in the Department of Corrections.

The boy's mother, Aroni Rucker, said Wednesday her son had trouble adjusting to his first year of school and may have been disruptive, but he did nothing to warrant such treatment.

"They put handcuffs on my baby," Rucker said. "That's for adults who murder and kill. He's 5. He's in kindergarten."

Rucker said she was planning to pull the boy and her second-grader from the school at the end of the semester when Morgan told her last week that the kindergartner could not come back.

St. Louis police spokesman Richard Wilkes said the department was looking into the incident. "Handcuffing 5-year-olds is not a practice of the department," he said.

The University of Missouri-St. Louis announced in August that it would end its sponsorship of the charter school, meaning the school must find a new sponsor by June or close. The university placed the school on probation twice, citing fiscal mismanagement, board corruption, poor academic performance and high turnover in leadership -- seven principals in five years.

University spokesman Bob Samples, part of the sponsorship team, said only that "it's inappropriate to handcuff a 5-year-old."

[alicia-w]

uh oh. this cant be good. the kid may be a brat but what can a 5 year old do to cause that much trouble that the principal said he cant come back? they dont tell you what he did....
it would be nice to know the whole story.

[sunny]

i agree that we don't know the whole story. but to put a five-year-old in handcuffs? i don't know...

[alicia-w]

i am in NO way agreeing with the handcuff thing. the principal sounds pretty heavy-handed but you dont have all the facts. is this guy a total jerk? is this kid just a victim?

i just think the story is incomplete. wish we knew more

[sunny]

i know you weren't agreeing with the handcuff thing

[TexasStooge]

I'm glad I'm not in that school.

[Derek Ortt]

if the kid continues to assault others, then the treatment may be for his own good. Better to be scared straiht at age 5, then be sentenced to life without parole or death at age 15

[sunny]

if the kid continues to assault others, then the treatment may be for his own good. Better to be scared straiht at age 5, then be sentenced to life without parole or death at age 15

That's an interesting thought, Derek. I hadn't thought of it like that.

[TexasStooge]

Speaking of Punishments, Dallas Independent School District has put Paddling on hold. Click on the link below to read the story.

http://www.storm2k.org/phpbb2/viewtopic ... 809#778809

[streetsoldier]

My question is, how did a Department of Corrections officer ever get a job in education?

IMHO, the school board should have "vetted" him before hiring; corrections officers, just like ex-policemen, often carry some of their former calling with them well after they turn in their badges. And, not necessarily to the good.

[rainstorm]

EXCELLENT POINT DEREK. i agree with boortz on this. i would hate to be that monsters teacher when he is 15. my guess is when that kid is 15, lots of do-gooders will wonder where the (SYSTEM) went wrong. that kid needs the strong hand of discipline now, not coddling.

THE PRINCIPAL OF THE YEAR

Sam Morgan, who is the Principal at the Thurgood Marshall Academy, a charter school in St. Louis, has been placed on leave. And what did he do? He had the police handcuff and arrest an unruly 5-year-old, in the hopes of trying to set the kid straight. That's too bad. We need more principals like him.

The real disaster here is this little troublemaker's mother, a woman named Aroni Rucker. She was quoted as saying "They put handcuffs on my baby. That's for adults who murder and kill. He's 5. He's in kindergarten." So what is her "baby" guilty of doing?

According to the principal, "This kid is heading for the Department of Corrections at 5. He fights, strikes somebody practically every day on the bus. He's a constant disruption." Doesn't sound much like an innocent little 5-year-old Momma wants to make him out to be.

It used to be when a kid got in trouble at school, the kid was most concerned about his parents not finding out. Now, because so-called parents don't want to be the least bit criticized for their awful parenting skills and disastrous offspring, their kid can do no wrong. This principal will probably be fired for trying to turn this kid's life around.

Maybe we could use this principal somewhere else in the government. Come to think of it, there is an opening at the Department of Homeland Security.

Meanwhile ... I wonder why we haven't heard from the child's father?
http://www.boortz.com