Outrage spread across the internet earlier this month as videos of daycare employees terrifying the young children in their care surfaced. In the videos, a worker can be seen wearing a scary Halloween mask, screaming at terrorized children.
Since the videos began circulating, the employees in question have been terminated.
CW: Some of the content of this article may be disturbing.
Posted to Facebook and other social media sites, the videos were shot within the daycare by another employee, whose identity is not known.
The videos were posted to Reddit by a user who goes by mississippiwildman. In them, screaming children cower as one worker wears a mask resembling that from the movie Scream, as another directs her to punish kids who have been poorly behaved.
Another employee instructs her, telling her which kids have been good, and which have been bad.
The children, who all seem to be preschool age, scream and cry as the "monster" demands that they begin cleaning. At one point, she chases a child and picks him up, putting him back in the toy area.
According to the Munroe Journal, Sheila Sanders, who owns the daycare, fired the individuals when she was made aware of the situation: "I contacted my licensure, and she has gotten involved. The people that did those acts are no longer with us. They were fired. I wasn’t here at the time and wasn’t aware they were doing that. I don’t condone that and never have."
One clip was filmed back in September, while another one was filmed the Tuesday before the videos first surfaced online, according to the Associated Press. Sanders confirmed that she was unaware of the incident from September.
The Monroe County Sheriff's Department posted to Facebook that one set of parents whose child was present during the incidents had decided to press charges against the former employees.
The former employees are Sierra McCandless, Oci-Anna Kilburn, Jennifer Newman, and Shyenne Shelton. A fifth employee, Traci Hutson, has been charged with the misdemeanors of failure to report abuse by a mandatory reporter and simple assault against a minor.
Katelyn Johnson is the mother of Pierce, the two-year-old boy who was picked up during one of the incidents. She spoke about the trauma her toddler son has experienced.
"He has reactions to the specific mask that she used, and we’ve had a few nights where it’s hard for him to either go to bed or he’ll be waking up in the middle of the night but it’s not anything that positive reinforcement can’t help with," she told the Monroe Journal.
"I hope, for anything, there is justice for the children and at the end of this, all the women involved are brought to light with all the damage they have done and the trauma brought to the families, the parents and the children," she said, further explaining that she will wait until the investigation is completed before decided whether or not to press charges.
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h/t: Monroe Journal
