Parents are in uproar after footage emerged which appeared to show a daycare worker pulling a child’s hair to force her to eat.
The video recorded at My Little Playhouse Learning Center in Lubbock, Texas, shows a young girl being grabbed forcefully by her hair while another woman films her and laughs.
The worker can be heard telling the little girl to eat her food; when she doesn’t, the woman grabs her hair and pulls her towards her plate.
As the shocking footage is being filmed, other children can be seen eating in the background as the camera occasionally takes in the rest of the room.
The entire thing lasts for less than a minute but in that time, the little girl is grabbed, tapped forcefully on the head and has her hair pulled multiple times.
While all of this is happening, the person filming the incident laughs and doesn’t intervene at any point, instead choosing to continue recording.
You can watch the moment it all unfolds here:
It’s not known when the video was filmed, but spread on social media on Thursday (January 17) and has since gone viral.
As reported by KCBD, concerned parents picked up their children from the daycare centre after watching the footage online. The grandmother of the child in the video, Shanna Walker, saw the video just 20 minutes before she was due to pick her up.
Shanna told KCBD:
I was furious. My initial reaction was to come and snatch her head off her body. It’s very frightening.
The grandmother continued by saying the employees at My Little Playhouse Learning Center are supposed to take care of the children and have their wellbeing at heart.
She went on:
But when you come to find out something like this is happening… I know that everyone thinks that their grandchildren are the best. But this little girl, she is the sweetest little girl that you could ever know. And she’s very quiet and very timid.
So, for her to sit there and just to pull on her hair – it’s very infuriating. I mean I’m standing here right now, feeling like I’m about to boil over.
Lubbock Police Department have since provided a statement, saying an investigation is currently underway and officers are ‘thoroughly looking into this incident’.
They wrote:
The Lubbock Police Department was made aware of a video circulating Facebook involving a young child at a daycare in the 3600 block of 50th Street.
Once the video was brought to LPD’s attention, officers responded to the business to investigate. Through the investigation, it was determined this incident occurred on a previous date. This case remains under investigation.
CLARIFICATION: Many people are asking why we included the date. When we post information about an incident we try to…
Posted by Lubbock Police Department on Thursday, 17 January 2019
Officials at My Little Playhouse issued a statement regarding the incident, obtained by KCBD, in which they say the staff involved have since been fired.
They wrote:
The owners and Directors of My Little Playhouse Learning Center LLC were made aware of video footage posted on social media at approximately 11:45 a.m.
Staff involved were fired immediately. Local authorities (LPD) has been notified and are investigating accordingly. Texas Department of Childcare Licensing has also been notified.
Hopefully the little girl is okay and hasn’t been hurt too badly by the incident.
If you have a story you want to tell, send it to [email protected].
A Broadcast Journalism Masters graduate who went on to achieve an NCTJ level 3 Diploma in Journalism, Lucy has done stints at ITV, BBC Inside Out and Key 103. While working as a journalist for UNILAD, Lucy has reported on breaking news stories while also writing features about mental health, cervical screening awareness, and Little Mix (who she is unapologetically obsessed with).