A Tuskawilla Middle School teacher who teaches seventh-grade science has been charged with a third-degree felony after sheriff's deputies in Seminole County said she pulled a student out of her classroom by the arm. She has not been convicted, and her attorney disputes how the incident has been described.
Deputies arrested Fada Concepcion on Thursday, Oct. 1, once the student's father asked that charges be filed, according to the sheriff's office as reported by WESH 2. WFTV reported that the charge is child abuse.
What the arrest report says
The incident happened Tuesday, Sept. 29. According to the arrest report, campus camera footage showed the teacher pulling the boy up from his desk and moving him by the arm 20 feet or more to an outdoor hallway, where he was left. The report says the student told deputies he had been worried about getting in trouble with his father.
When deputies interviewed her, Concepcion said she did not recall dragging the student and that she had walked him out while he kept slumping over, the report states. Asked to explain what the video showed, she said she could not.
The defense and the prosecution
Concepcion's attorney told WESH that the student had been misbehaving and that his client was escorting him out of the room. The attorney said nothing in the probable cause affidavit indicates the student was injured, with no bruising, and argued that the facts do not reach the level of child abuse.
