A Massachusetts daycare worker is facing charges after the mother of a 2-year-old filed a police report, claiming the worker taped her daughter’s mouth shut.
On Thursday, Feb. 16, Nyasia Holmes, the child’s mother, reported that Amy Li of Here We Grow Day Care in Randolph taped her daughter Kaiya’s mouth shut because she was having a tantrum and the caretaker didn’t want her to disturb the other children.
Boston 25 News reports Holmes filed a report with the Randolph Police Department. The 26-year-old caretaker faces charges of reckless endangerment of a child and assault and battery and has been issued a summons to appear in Quincy District Court at a later date.
Holmes, who also filed a report with the Department of Children and Families, said she wants to know why she reported what she says her daughter experienced to the police, but the daycare didn’t.
Holmes took to Facebook to tell her story, saying Kaiya had been going to the facility for a year before the incident. Holmes also noted she was mortified when she learned what happened to the child on that particular day.
“I was informed by the person who did this to my child that she put tape on my child’s mouth in a playing manner,” Holmes said, adding that “another person witnessed this” and that Li only told her what happened because someone else had seen the incident and complained about it, and that Li was ” … she informed me … what actually took place to my child [and] [Li by telling me] was “trying to cover her tracks.”
She continued, “I then called the other party and got the actual story she had my child in a thinking chair with tape on her mouth because she was having a tantrum and she was going to wake up the other kids every child was sleeping but mine.”
Holmes said another staff member witnessed part of the reported incident and informed the center’s director.
According to Holmes’ social media post, the incident happened around 3 p.m. on the afternoon of Thursday, Feb. 16, and the incident was reported to the director around 5:27 p.m. She added that she picked her child up at 6 p.m. and that it wasn’t until the next morning that “the person who did this to my child” and not the director informed her.
Holmes blasted Here We Grow Day Care, saying, “Why did you think it was okay to put a 2-year-old in a thinking chair and obstruct her breathing and talking? You will never do this to another child again.”
“And moms should feel safe about being at work and knowing that their kids are okay,” she said.
Holmes also said, “I’m angry that she exposed my child to that type of torture.”
She also expressed that she thinks this wasn’t the first time something like this had happened, according to the Daily Beast.
Holmes, after reporting the act to officials, asked to have a meeting with the director and Li.
“I requested a meeting with all parties,” she wrote. “The director was literally doing the report during the meeting at 12 p.m.”
The mother said during the meeting Li “never apologized for what she did” to the young child.
“I was an abused child,” she shared. “This is causing me so much distress because I do everything in my power to protect my children.”
Holmes videotaped Kaiya explaining the incident, and, with her limited vocabulary, the child imitates getting popped on the hands.
“When I ask my child if this person boo boo her, she puts her hands out like she hit hers there and she say this person name not nice,” the mom said in the long post, before writing, “I want justice for my child.”
