Story By: Ana Lacasa, Sub Editor: Joseph Golder, Agency: CEN
Video Credit: CEN
This footage shows a nursery teacher covering the face of a crying four-month-old baby with a towel and violently shaking the distressed tot in a baby bouncer.
The footage was reportedly recorded at a nursery in La Plata in the Argentine capital Buenos Aires when teacher Paula Gonzalez was looking after baby Pilar, who was four months old at the time.
In the video, which was recorded last year but has only recently surfaced in local media, teacher Gonzalez can be seen violently shaking the tot’s baby bouncer as she cries and she can then be seen putting a towel over Pilar’s head.
Pictures Credit: CEN
The baby continues crying and Gonzalez can be seen violently shaking the bouncer and touching the girl’s head to try and calm her down.
The girl’s mother, Carolina Penzi, stopped taking her baby to the nursery in August 2018 when she noticed the tot had injuries to her face with scratches and bruises.
Penzi then filed a report with penal prosecutors in October of last year and asked for the footage from the CCTV cameras in the nursery to be studied.
Local media report after the video emerged the teacher Paula Gonzalez was fired and she has been charged with causing light injuries but has not been judged.
Reports state other teachers from the nursery are being interrogated despite there being no witnesses and the headmaster of the nursery will be called to the stand next week.
The mother wrote on social media that she had recently seen the video of the alleged abuse “after seven months of agony”, adding: “She was given back to me with injuries to her arm and face that took a week to disappear. It was very cruel and painful for me to see how the teacher shakes her violently, how she grabbed her arms with violence.
“How she was turned back repeatedly hitting her little body against the baby bouncer and how she covered her face with a blanket using her strength against her face.”
Penzi is asking for the nursery to be shut down forever and the investigation is ongoing.
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