Illinois High School Resource Officer Arrested For Attacking Student

A resource officer from an Illinois high school is facing criminal charges after a video showed him slamming down a student.

A shocking video released on Friday shows an employee from Proviso West High School in Illinois physically assaulting a student, ABC7 Chicago reports. In the grainy video, the resource officer can be seen confronting a student in the front of a classroom before grabbing the student and throwing them to the ground in what’s described as an “unprompted assault.”

After seeing the video, the school Superintendent, Dr. James Henderson, says that school officials were directed to contact the police and ban the staffer from entering school grounds.

“I am extremely disappointed, no—I’m upset by what transpired today,” Henderson said. “No adult should ever put their hands on a child in that manner—especially not in a school setting.”

“The behavior exhibited by the SRO is consistent with what we see flash across our TV screens almost daily – with Black and Brown young men being targets of police officers,” Henderson added.

Hillside police said the arrested employee was not a registered law enforcement officer in the state. As of Saturday, the staffer was still in police custody.

But the police were offended and demanded an apology after the school initially claimed the arrested employee was a police officer, Fox News reports.

“It should be noted this non-certified security officer is African American which negates the Superintendent’s underlying message that this is another example of police officers being driven by racial prejudice in the beating of this student,” Hillside Police Chief Joseph Lukaszek said.