A Texas high school teacher seen repeatedly slapping a student on a now-viral video was arrested on Friday.
The teacher was identified by NBC News as 63-year-old Mary Hastings of Ozen High School in Beaumont, Texas. According to NBC News, the video was recorded Friday and discovered later that day by school officials.
The video shows Hastings slapping the Black student as punishment for allegedly disrupting her class. She repeatedly strikes the student in the head.
You can hear the woman say:
“Because you’re stopping him from graduating, you idiot a**!” Hastings says while slapping the student.
“Why you did that?” the student asks after Hastings strikes him.
There is yelling and laughing in the background as well. The student who was assaulted also seems to be laughing after Hastings attacked him.
According to local Texas news outlet KFDM, an Ozen student spoke up to defend the veteran teacher. That student has decided to remain anonymous to avoid possible backlash. The student told KFDM that Hastings is a great teacher and that students always throw things and cuss at the woman before the video surfaced.
“You know we only see 12 seconds of it. That’s all it is. It’s not the whole thing,” the student said to the Texas news outlet. “They were saying that’s not like her. They were upset that she had done it. It was hurtful. She had to be escorted off campus.”
The racial overtones of the situation continues an unfortunate trend of violence involving students and school officials. Video surfaced last week of a San Antonio student being body-slammed by a police officer and temporarily knocked out by the officer.
Since the incident, Hastings has been arrested for assault in Jefferson County. Also, the Beaumont Independent School District removed her from the classroom and placed her on leave.
“The Beaumont Independent School District can confirm that an Ozen High School teacher was arrested today for physically assaulting a student,” the district said.
Over the weekend, Hastings was released on a $2,500 bond.
