A 6-year-old Colorado boy was suspended from school for 2 days for kissing a female classmate on the hand.
The national media dragged the school district for burdening first-grader Hunter Yelton with a “sexual harassment” infraction on his school records. In response to the public outcry, the district downgraded the sexual harassment charge to misconduct.
The boy’s mother, Jennifer Saunders, expressed outrage at the school district’s decision to suspend her son.
“He is 6 years old, and that is absolutely ridiculous for him to have ‘sexual harassment’ on his record, even it is (only on the district’s) record,” she said.
But the girl’s mother stands behind the school’s decision to suspend the boy and to label him a sexual predator.
According to MSN.com, Jade Masters-Ownbey told the Canon City Daily Record on Wednesday that the school district did a “great job” protecting her daughter from repeated harassment from the boy.
Masters-Ownbey says Hunter has harassed her daughter repeatedly. She said the kissing was “not once, but over and over.”
The media portrayed Hunter as an adorable child who simply has too much energy. But School officials indicated the boy may have a behavioral problem. School officials say Hunter was told repeatedly to stop kissing girls and causing a distraction in class.
Lincoln Elementary School Principal Tammy DeWolfe said the school would “never suspend a student for one minor little violation.”
Masters-Ownbey said the girl’s older brother felt the need to defend his little sister.
“In elementary school, when a boy kisses a girl, the usual response of their peers is ‘ewwww,'” she stated. “So why do the other kids rush to tell? Because they’ve seen it over and over, they’ve seen him repeatedly get in trouble for it, they’ve seen the girl repeatedly tell him to stop, they know it’s wrong.”
