Newly released body cam video shows Orlando cops arresting 6-year-old Kaia Rolls after her school called police to report her "having a tantrum."
“Help me, help me, please,” the girl cries as the cops put her in handcuffs, while school officials stand by.
orlandosentinel.com/news/crime/os-…
“Help me, help me, please,” the girl cries as the cops put her in handcuffs, while school officials stand by.
orlandosentinel.com/news/crime/os-…
When Officer Dennis Turner arrives to the school principal's office, Kaia asks him what the zip tie handcuffs he is holding are. “They’re for you,” he says as the other officer proceeds to cuff her. “No .. no, don’t put handcuffs on," she begs sobbing.
None of the school officials do anything to intervene, but when one asks if the cuffs are necessary, Turner says, “Yes, If she was bigger, she would have been wearing regular handcuffs.”
Video shows Kaia continuing to cry as she walks to the police car with the officers. “I don’t wanna go in a police car," she says. “You don’t want to? You have to," says the second police officer. “Please, give me a second chance,” Kaia says desperately crying.
In the video, Officer Turner boasts that the youngest child he ever arrested was a 7-year-old boy who he caught stealing at an Albertsons. He said he arrested the boy because he had “thought it was a joke" while the other children caught in the act had started crying.
When school officials tell him that Kaia is 6, he says “Now she has broken the record."
Kaia's family released this video footage to @orlandosentinel in the hope that people will watch it and support a new law that will create a minimum age of criminal responsibility in Florida of 12. Currently there is none - children as young as 4 have been arrested in the state.
@orlandosentinel This is Kaia's grandmother, Meralyn Kirkland, talking about that new legislation. orlandosentinel.com/news/crime/os-…
@orlandosentinel And for people who may not be aware of the circumstances of Kaia's arrest, which happened in September 2019 - here is a thread.
@orlandosentinel Also know that this video does not show everything terrible that happened to Kaia - she was fingerprinted, had her mugshot taken and was processed through a juvenile detention center - there just isn't video of that.
And remember there are countless children like Kaia whose stories do not get told because there isn't video or they don't have caregivers who are able to get their stories out to the media in the way that Kaia's family have been able to.
That's why it's so important that we channel our outrage into supporting laws that increase the age of criminal responsibility to 12, like the one proposed in Florida.
PS I should point out, the cops were assigned to the school, so when I said "called the police," they were already there. As Ms. Kirkland, Kaia's grandmother, emphasizes, along with raising the age of criminal responsibility, this is the critical issue that needs to be addressed.
