Tayshawn Chadwick was shocked with a Taser by a school officer.<\/span> <\/p>\nIn interviews, dozens of parents, teachers, principals and students said that they believed police officers were needed to keep schools safe. Many praised officers for stopping violent fights. Almost everyone cited fear of school shootings. As recently as March, a student at a high school in the San Antonio area shot a teacher and then killed himself. School officers have confiscated dozens of guns in that region alone, and some have thwarted potential attacks.<\/p>\n
\u201cJust look at the TV,\u201d said LaTres Essien, who teaches third-grade math in Dallas. \u201cThere\u2019s no school in America that should not have some kind of officer.\u201d<\/p>\n
Police chiefs said physical force was necessary in police work, even at schools. \u201cWe can\u2019t be lackadaisical and say, \u2018Well, we\u2019re in a school, and maybe we shouldn\u2019t go hands on with this student,\u2019 and then it rises to a level that he or she does hurt someone,\u201d said Charles Carnes, who in December retired as chief of the Northside school district\u2019s department in San Antonio.<\/p>\n
Some departments disciplined officers for going too far, including in the hogtie incident and the pepper-spray and vape cases shown in the videos above. (Neither the officer involved in the lunchroom brawl case nor his department provided comment.)<\/p>\n
But in Texas, no state agency has the power to routinely review school officers\u2019 actions and weigh in on possible overreach.<\/p>\n
Lawmakers here have embraced school policing without establishing safeguards required for meaningful accountability, policing experts said. A 2019 law meant to keep officers out of \u201croutine student discipline\u201d does not define the term or detail repercussions for violations. Police departments in Texas are not required to report incidents of force in schools unless they shoot someone.<\/p>\n
School boards and police agencies are responsible for oversight, state officials said. But in interviews, two dozen board members from across Texas said they did not consider that part of their job. \u201cWe just approve what they need to buy,\u201d said Michael Valdez, a board member in the Edgewood school district in San Antonio.<\/p>\n
Several said they were unaware that their officers used force on students at all.<\/p>\n
A review of use-of-force policies from more than 200 school district police departments found that many were largely copied from those used by municipal police agencies. Some addressed how to handle livestock and animal control calls. Most provided no specific guidance on handling students.<\/p>\n
\u2018Eyes Wide Open\u2019<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n
Police officers have been assigned to some schools in Texas for nearly a century. In the 1930s, newspaper articles show, the Houston Police Department employed part-time \u201cschool policemen\u201d to help direct traffic.<\/p>\n
But it was not until the 1980s and \u201990s, amid concerns about drugs and violence, that the ranks of school officers began to swell. The 1999 shooting at Columbine High School in Colorado led to a larger rise.<\/p>\n
Elsewhere in the country, school districts typically tapped the local sheriff\u2019s office or police department for officers. Texas was unusual in that many districts formed their own departments instead.<\/p>\n
As police presence in schools grew, some educators became wary of harsh punishment and practices that could push students into the criminal justice system. Even in law-and-order Texas, concerns seemed to break through. In 2019, the Legislature passed a law saying that school boards should not task officers with routine student discipline.<\/p>\n
Then came Uvalde, the deadliest school shooting in Texas history, which claimed the lives of 19 students and two teachers.<\/p>\n
A year later, in 2023, lawmakers passed legislation to require at least one licensed police officer at each of the state\u2019s public schools. While other states had taken steps to increase school security, few relied as heavily on the police.<\/p>\n
Before the Texas law was adopted, some parents, teachers and advocates warned that it would lead to more arrests and incidents involving force. Alycia Castillo, the associate director of policy and advocacy for the Texas Civil Rights Project, a nonprofit based in Austin, said that several groups had already raised concerns about heavy-handed police tactics in schools. Lawmakers, she said in an interview, had their \u201ceyes wide open.\u201d<\/p>\n
In the two years that followed, statewide annual spending on school security rose to more than $1.3 billion from about $900 million.<\/p>\n
Kirby Warnke, the chief of the Corpus Christi school district police department and president of the Texas School District Police Chiefs\u2019 Association, said his officers got physical with students to restrain or redirect them.<\/span> Meridith Kohut for The New York Times<\/span><\/p>\nToday, Texas is home to nearly 400 school district police departments, more than all other states combined. Most of the remaining districts have contracts with outside police agencies. The number of officers trained to work in schools \u2014 about 11,000 \u2014 exceeds the total number of police officers in at least two dozen states.<\/p>\n
Most of what school officers do is mundane. They secure external doors, usher students through metal detectors and monitor hallways for fights. Some mentor students and offer advice.<\/p>\n
But routine interactions have been punctuated at times by physical encounters. Officers grabbed or tackled students hundreds of times, data and records show. They used pepper spray in dozens of cases and shocked students with Tasers in at least nine incidents. On four occasions, reporters found, officers held teenagers at gunpoint.<\/p>\n
Some large school districts reported using force more than 100 times in a school year. In an interview, Kirby Warnke, the chief of the Corpus Christi school district police department, said that his officers got physical with students \u201calmost every day,\u201d often to restrain or redirect them.<\/p>\n
Students were left with bruises, scrapes or other injuries in nearly a quarter of the 450 cases reviewed by reporters. Two teenagers suffered concussions, according to medical records and an interview with one family\u2019s lawyer.<\/p>\n
About two dozen of the overall cases involved children in elementary school. In the Northside school district, an officer handcuffed a 6-year-old boy who kicked a school employee during a tantrum.<\/p>\n
State law prohibits using restraints on children in fifth grade or below in all but the most dangerous situations. In a statement, the district said that the officer had perceived an \u201cimmediate risk of harm.\u201d<\/p>\n
The boy was still in cuffs when his father arrived a few minutes later and began filming on his cellphone.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe police wants me to die!\u201d the child cried.<\/p>\n
\u2018The Heavy Hand\u2019<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n
In May 2024, Anabelle Jaramillo rang a plastic doorbell outside a classroom at Texas City High School. The $13 bell came off and Anabelle walked away with it, according to a description of surveillance footage included in a police report.<\/p>\n
The next day, administrators accused the 17-year-old honor student of theft and assigned her three days of in-school suspension.<\/p>\n
Certain there had been a misunderstanding, Anabelle showed up at the office of Sonia Davis, an assistant principal. She told Ms. Davis that she had accidentally dislodged the doorbell and tucked it into a nearby planter so that she would not get in trouble, she recalled in an interview.<\/p>\n
Still, Ms. Davis summoned the Galveston County sheriff\u2019s deputies at the school and, body camera footage shows, asked them to speak with Anabelle about theft.<\/p>\n
Anabelle continued to plead her case. She texted her mother, and Ms. Davis extended her suspension by two days for using a cellphone in the office. Ms. Davis told Anabelle to leave. But the teenager would not budge from her seat.<\/p>\n
Anabelle gasped for air for about three minutes before going still, body camera footage shows. Ms. Davis called for the school nurse. Deputy Ruiz took her pulse. Anabelle later told reporters that she had passed out.<\/p>\n
Other cases reviewed by reporters similarly escalated.<\/p>\n
A staff member called for an officer when a 17-year-old in a special education class threatened a classmate and threw a \u201csanitizer can\u201d at the student, the police report said; the officer dragged the boy to the ground and, after a scuffle, punched him in the face twice, video footage shows.<\/p>\n
A teacher alerted an officer to a 15-year-old who was swearing in a hallway; the officer took the student down, records show, and dragged him into a room by his leg.<\/p>\n
In interviews, educators said that they sometimes needed help managing unruly students. Many feel pressure to be tough on misbehavior, said Anita Wadhwa, a former teacher who now runs a nonprofit in Houston focused on alternative approaches to school discipline.<\/p>\n
\u201cNo adult wants to look like a kid is talking back to them,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Some school district leaders said that they had sent a clear message: Officers should get involved only if a student is accused of a serious crime or if someone is at risk of physical harm.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur officers are not disciplinarians, period,\u201d said Sean Maika, who was the superintendent of the North East Independent School District in San Antonio until January.<\/p>\n
But in many places, that message seems to have gotten lost. Michelle Parsons, who teaches a training course required for school officers in Texas, said that officers frequently described being pulled into minor disciplinary matters. At a recent training attended by a reporter, officers were told to stay out of incidents that would not otherwise prompt a 911 call. Several scoffed and said their principals would be unhappy.<\/p>\n
Anabelle Jaramillo, an honor student, was arrested less than a month before graduation.<\/span> <\/p>\nMrs. Parsons said that principals and teachers often see officers as \u201cthe heavy hand.\u201d Texas does not require them to be trained on when to call school police.<\/p>\n
Shortly after Anabelle\u2019s arrest, her mother, Martha Jaramillo, arrived at the school to find her on the ground, footage shows. \u201cShe was very rude to us,\u201d Ms. Davis, the assistant principal, told Mrs. Jaramillo.<\/p>\n
Mrs. Jaramillo told the nurse about her daughter\u2019s health conditions, including asthma. One of the deputies called for paramedics, who took the teenager to an emergency room.<\/p>\n
Two weeks later, Anabelle turned herself in at the county jail for the theft charge. There, she said, she had another panic attack.<\/p>\n
Neither Ms. Davis nor Texas City school district officials agreed to be interviewed for this article. In a statement, the district said Ms. Davis had not violated its policies. The Galveston County Sheriff\u2019s Office declined to comment. The deputies involved in the case did not respond to multiple efforts to reach them.<\/p>\n
Kim Simon, a national expert on school policing and a former officer from Virginia who reviewed the case for The Times and The Express-News, said that Ms. Davis and the officers had escalated a minor offense unnecessarily.<\/p>\n
\u201cNobody was acting in the best interest of a child,\u201d Ms. Simon said.<\/p>\n
Command and Control<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n
Across the state, officers directed obscenities, insults and threats at students just before or after using physical force, records and video footage show.<\/p>\n
\u201cStop crying like a little girl,\u201d a school police officer in San Antonio ordered a seventh-grade boy who had gotten in trouble for being disruptive.<\/p>\n
\u201cBoy, I will hurt you,\u201d an officer in Houston told a high school student who talked back to him.<\/p>\n
\u201cGet your fucking hands up before I shoot you!\u201d an officer in Galveston shouted while pointing her gun at a 17-year-old she had cornered in a yard. The teen had run off campus after he was caught with a vape.<\/p>\n
Most officers employed by a Texas school district previously worked for municipal police agencies, an analysis of police certification data found. More than 1,000 worked as jailers.<\/p>\n
In those roles, officers are encouraged to have a commanding presence in order to take control of dangerous situations.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe notion of policing requires force,\u201d said Aaron Kupchik, a professor of sociology and criminal justice at the University of Delaware, who writes about school policing. \u201cIt requires that you compel people to obey your authority.\u201d<\/p>\n
But dealing with young people, he and other law enforcement experts said, calls for a different approach. Research shows that adolescents, whose brains have not yet fully developed, often have difficulty with impulse control. Yelling at or physically dominating them, the experts added, can backfire.<\/p>\n
Michelle Parsons teaches a training course required for school officers in Texas.<\/span> <\/p>\nIn Texas, the state-mandated training for school police officers includes instruction in child psychology, conflict resolution and managing students with behavioral issues. But at only 20 hours, the program is half the minimum recommended by the National Association of School Resource Officers. Kentucky, which also mandates officers at all public schools, requires 120 hours.<\/p>\n
When officers used force on students, department leaders almost always had the final say on whether they acted within bounds or overstepped.<\/p>\n
Supervisors often reviewed forms describing the incidents, and they noted on some whether they approved of the officers\u2019 actions. Reporters examined more than 100 such documents, finding that supervisors almost always determined that the force had been appropriate.<\/p>\n
In some other cases reviewed by reporters, officers were disciplined, but received little more than verbal warnings or orders to get additional training.<\/p>\n
In 2024, Officer Linda Holland used pepper spray to stop a group of girls from fighting and then kneed one of the girls in the face, video footage shows. She was required to complete four training courses, including one on ethics, according to an internal report. A supervisor wrote that her actions were \u201cnot a good look.\u201d<\/p>\n
Officer Holland hung up when a reporter called for comment. In a statement, the district described the scene as \u201cchaotic,\u201d adding that the officer did not intend to hurt the girl.<\/p>\n
Some parents, records show, took concerns about officers to the Texas Commission on Law Enforcement, which licenses all of the state\u2019s police officers. But the commission says it cannot investigate excessive force complaints unless the officer was criminally charged.<\/p>\n
In at least two cases, when parents have filed federal lawsuits against officers over use of force, the appellate court that covers Texas ruled against their claims. In 2023, the court ruled in favor of an officer who used a Taser on a 17-year-old boy with an intellectual disability when he tried to leave school. The court said that the officer\u2019s actions were akin to corporal punishment, which is legal in Texas.<\/p>\n
Alienated and withdrawn<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n
Some students who were subject to physical force from police officers said that they had suffered lingering consequences.<\/p>\n
Tayshawn Chadwick, who was stunned with a Taser, said he stopped leaving the house. Julian Montes, who was slammed into a lunch cart, is now afraid of police officers.<\/p>\n
Anabelle Jaramillo said the doorbell incident led her to become withdrawn from even close friends.<\/p>\n
Prosecutors dismissed the theft charge after she completed an online course about stealing. But she was mortified when a crime website posted her mug shot. She finished her classes from home and skipped her graduation ceremony.<\/p>\n
Anabelle with her graduation tassel. She did not attend the ceremony. <\/span> <\/p>\nTwo years later, Anabelle has finally begun to put the trauma behind her. She gave birth to a son and completed community college. She plans to attend a nearby university in the fall in hopes of becoming a veterinarian. But the police episode has made her less trusting. The adults at her high school, she said, had failed her.<\/p>\n
\u201cI thought they\u2019re there to hear you out, to build you up and get you into the future,\u201d she said. Instead, \u201cThey broke me down.\u201d<\/p>\n
Justin Mayo, Melissa Manno, Liz Teitz, Maggie Allwein and Teresa Mondr\u00eda Terol contributed reporting. Susan C. Beachy, Kitty Bennett, Alain Delaqu\u00e9ri\u00e8re, Georgia Gee, Sheelagh McNeill and Kirsten Noyes contributed research. Produced by Nico Chilla, Jerry Vienna and Rumsey Taylor. This article was reported in partnership with Big Local News at Stanford University.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Since the massacre at Robb Elementary in Uvalde in 2022, school districts across Texas have spent billions of dollars to station police officers on every campus in the state. The effort, the most ambitious in the nation, was intended to protect students from similar tragedies. But the constant presence of officers has transformed the way<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":49816,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[56],"tags":[24625,1551,334,678,9700,24626,1010],"class_list":{"0":"post-49815","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-crime-justice","8":"tag-peppersprayed","9":"tag-police","10":"tag-school","11":"tag-students","12":"tag-tackled","13":"tag-tasered","14":"tag-texas"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49815","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=49815"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49815\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/49816"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=49815"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=49815"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=49815"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}