A white man who claims to have adopted four Black children was shown on video grabbing and pulling the arms of his Black apparently adopted daughter as she cried outside of a Florida apartment complex Friday.
“Leave me alone, mister. Help me! Help me,” the apparently primary school-age child could be heard screaming in the video.
She also told the man tussling with her in front of a Providence Lakes Apartments sign that “a father doesn’t smack their children in the face.”
The encounter in Brandon, Florida, attracted the attention of a driver in the area who pulled over, recorded the encounter and confronted the man.
“What is going on?” the driver said after she got out of her car.
The man shown grabbing the girl in the video started explaining that the child is his daughter.
“I know but you’re kicking her,” the woman recording said. “You’re slapping her.”
Another white man on the scene who also said he’s parenting the child told the witness she was “full of s–t.”
“OK, thank you,” she said, dismissing him.
She then directed her attention to a person she was riding with.
“You can pull my car up,” she said. “I’ma call the police.”
“Call the cops,” the other man identifying as the father and observing the incident said. “You g—–n … We’ve got four Black children. You think we’re bigots?”
“You don’t kick this lil girl like this. You don’t do this,” the woman said.
The man observing countered with the claim that the child goes to a psychiatrist.
“She’s nuts,” he said.
“That’s fine,” she said. “I have a child that also suffers from…”
The woman couldn’t be heard over the child’s sobbing.
“You’ve got a crazy child too,” the man asked. “So that’s your fault. She’s our fault.”
At one point in the encounter the man grabbing the child could be heard saying, “I’m trying to keep you from being hit by a car.”
He explained that she had walked out of their apartment and he scolded the woman recording.
“Jesus f—–g Christ. Mind your own g—–n business,” he said.
At that point, the child defended the woman.
“Leave her alone. She’s just trying to help me,” the girl said.
She added, “You’re hurting me.”
The man holding her responded, “Now you’re making all these people think that I’ve done something to you.”
“You did,” the child interrupted.
It’s unclear what led to the encounter, but the Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office said deputies were called to the incident early Friday.
It’s unclear if authorities plan to follow up on the incident.
