Childcare worker arrested after 'restraining boy, 7, as daughter, 4, hit him'
A childcare worker has been fired after a video allegedly showed her restraining a young boy in her care while her own four-year-old daughter hit him.
Martha Balmaseda Marrero, 31, was caught on video holding the boy’s arms behind his back as the girl, later identified as her own daughter, struck him, police say.
The seven-year-old boy’s mother is pressing charges over the March 1 incident that also resulted in the daycare worker’s termination, the Miami Herald reports.
Balmaseda Marrero’s arrest report includes a statement from her insisting she was simply trying to teach her daughter some self-defence techniques.
“So, I told this girl to defense [sic] herself,” Balmaseda Marrero wrote.
“I hold the kid just to protect the girl, never with the intention of the boy to get hurt.”
The report from the Monroe County Sheriff’s Office noted the boy did not sustain any serious injuries.
The former employee at St Justin Martyr Catholic Church’s daycare centre in Key Largo was reported to the Florida Department of Children and Families.
The incident has since become a criminal matter with Balmaseda Marrero arrested for battery and then released on an AU$7000 bond.
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