Enraged parents of a Texas first-grader say their daughter was forced to perform a sex act on another student in the classroom as other students looked on — and as one recorded the horrifying assault on a school-issued iPad.
About 200 infuriated parents protested outside the administrative offices of the Plainview Independent School District on Friday, chanting, “Be their voice!” as they expressed dismay over the school’s botched response to the alleged assault.
The April 19 incident at Plainview South Elementary only came to light when a parent spread the word on social media, the Plainview Herald reported.
The district first acknowledged the assault a week later following public outcry.
Heather Gonzales, an older cousin of the 6-year-old girl who was assaulted, said she noticed a shift in the young girl’s behavior after the traumatic event.
“She’s in distress, she’s like, ‘My stomach hurts. I just want to lay down,'” Gonzales told KCBD. “You can tell something’s wrong with her. So, they said, ‘What’s going on? What happened?'”
The young girl told her family that a boy had exposed himself to her while in the lunch line at school.
She later mentioned that a week before that incident, she was pulled under a desk and forced to perform a sex act on a male student.
The latter incident was recorded by another student on a school-issued iPad.
The video reportedly showed the young girl doing her best to fight off her attacker from underneath the desk.
“She said she was hitting him with the poetry book,” Gonzales said, adding that when she asked how long the incident went on for, her cousin told her “until they let me go.”
A day after the incident, students watched the video of the assault until the teacher took the iPad — which had been locked by a student — and sent the device to IT to be opened.
That was when the teacher allegedly realized what happened, according to the Plainview Herald.
Gonzalez slammed the district for not being forthcoming with information about the assault.
“Everything was ‘No comment. I cannot tell you. No comment,'” Gonzales told KCBD. “You mean to tell me abuse was happening for a week and a half, and these kids are still at the same desk? My cousin is still at a desk with all boys, having to see her abusers every day.”
During Friday’s protest, Gonzales said she hoped to prevent the district from sweeping what happened under the rug.
People traveled from surrounding communities to march alongside the Plainview community and demand accountability from administrators on Friday, which was the second protest held following the incident.
Protesters demanded that South Elementary Principal Jennifer Hughey and Superintendent H.T. Sanchez be fired.
The teacher involved, who apparently could not see the incident from where they were in the classroom, has been placed on administrative leave, according to the Plainview Herald.
The victim’s family says they still have not been shown the video and claim district officials told them there was nothing to see.
The family has since hired an attorney, Gonzales said.
Plainview’s superintendent said that once the video was discovered, a report was made and CPS was contacted.
A state investigator took up the case the next week, KCBD reported.
“We hope to find a direction with them forward,” Sanchez said. “Definitely for the young people and how we can help them heal and move forward.”
Following the incident, Gonzales said she’s heard from many others who have gone through similar experiences with the school district.
It’s also not the first time Sanchez has been met with backlash due to his response to sexual assault.
Before he began working for the Plainview Independent School District in 2018, Sanchez led the Tucson Unified School District, where he made headlines after a student in the district reported her teacher sexually abused her and school officials waited six days to notify police.
Four months after the incident, Sanchez resigned from his role, KCBD reported in 2018.
Gonzales plans to share the stories she’s been told regarding similar incidents at the next school board meeting on May 18.
