COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) – A group of black parents plans to present a petition calling for officials to drop charges against a 16-year-old South Carolina high school student who was videotaped being yanked from her desk and thrown to the floor by a police officer in her classroom.
A misdemeanor charge of disturbing schools was filed against the student and an 18-year-old who videotaped the incident on her cellphone at Spring Valley High School in Columbia.
Richland 2 Black Parents Association says it has hundreds of thousands of signatures from people around the country calling for Solicitor Dan Johnson to drop the charges.
Association members plan to be at Johnson’s office Thursday afternoon. The students in the case are black, and the officer is white. The officer, Richland County deputy Ben Fields, was fired.
Johnson says in a statement he can’t make any decision about the charges against the students until the FBI finishes its investigation of Fields.
