A Florida high school student and her family are accusing police of using excessive force after video emerged of a cop slamming her into the ground.
Ikeria Tate, 15, was seen on cellphone footage being grabbed and pulled to the ground after an incident at Miami Edison High School on Wednesday.
According to the teenager, a fight involving students and parents broke out outside the locker rooms of the school following a football game.
Due to the altercation, a Miami-Dade Schools Police officer intervened and pulled her from a nearby crowd before throwing her to the ground.
In the video, which was shared to social media, the unidentified officer can be seen grabbing the teen by the shoulders before flipping her over.
The teenager then gets back up on her feet causing the officer to grab her again, police have accused her of attempting to hit the cop.
Speaking with WPLG Local10, Tate said: ‘He should’ve never done that. He had grabbed me and slammed me on the floor and one of them stepped on my hair.’
The teenager also claimed that she never hit out at the officer, adding: ‘I wasn’t throwing a punch at him. I was telling him to get off me.’
Her mother Monique Warner has also came forward and said she believes the officer went too far.
Warner told the outlet: ‘I feel like he shouldn’t have done that to my child. If anything, you should’ve tried to restrain her in a better way.
‘He shouldn’t put his hands on nobody’s kids like that. You are supposed to help them. This is why the kids are scared of the law.’
In an arrest report seen by the outlet, Miami-Dade Schools said that Tate pushed a responding sergeant and then tried to punch the officer in the face.
The police report also states that Tate ‘became combative by tensing and pulling away. The defendant continued being combative and attempted to strike the Sergeant with a closed fist’.
Tate was arrested and charged with battery on a law enforcement officer, resisting arrest and disrupting a school function.
The teenager is currently on home detention and is only allowed to leave for school, medical reasons, church or in case of an emergency.
According to Miami-Dade Schools Police they are investigating the incident.