It turns out the Colorado school bus driver who made international news this week for getting caught-on-tape slapping a 10-year-old child wearing a mask below her nose was actually fired last month when the incident occurred.
Driver Bertram Jaquez has also been arrested on charges filed last weekend of harassment, assault causing injury, and child abuse.
Fremont County School officials said in a written statement it is “never okay to lay a hand on a child.”
But then followed up with this cringe-worthy statement that seems to suggest the child is just as much at fault for not following the rules on how to wear the mask.
“Our goal everyday is to transport students safely to school and back home, but that can only happen when everyone, including students and staff, follow the rules. We are currently working to identify next steps to help our drivers with strategies designed to support a safe ride to and from school.”
The student said in a handwritten statement obtained by KKTV-TV of Colorado Springs that she was seated in the back of the bus when a group of children told her to put her mask on. The girl, whose name was redacted, wrote that she told her classmates that she wasn’t going to wear it because the mask makes her sick.
The girl started going “back and forth” with her classmates when the bus driver walked over to see what was going on, the statement reads.
The girl said that people kept telling her to put her mask on and that she “yelled at them and said you shut up you’re not involved in this,” it reads. She said that’s when the driver slapped her.
It sounds like a lot of adults are at fault in this case, for traumatizing children over their risk of contracting COVID-19.