Teacher Uses Hot Sauce to Punish Students
A teacher in Florida is currently sitting in the hot seat after reports of her using hot sauce to discipline her students made their way to school officials and unhappy parents.
Lillian Gomez, the special needs teacher at Sunrise Elementary School of Osceola County, could be fired for allegedly using the hot sauce to discipline her students.
Gomez is accused of putting hot sauce on the ends of crayons in an effort to stop the autistic children in her classroom from putting the crayons in their mouths and eating them.
Get Our Latest News for FREE
Family members of some of the children are upset that this was allowed to happen and some are even calling the school district to terminate the teacher's employment, according to WFTV.
"I was really upset. I couldn't believe it. Honestly, I was like how can a teacher of so many years do something like that," concerned family member, Karina Holguin, said.
"They got to be traumatized, especially for a kid who can't express himself like any other children that can tell you this hurts or doesn't hurt," she added.
Holguin is the aunt of two of the children involved in this incident. The alleged incident happened last fall and Gomez is currently suspended from her job while awaiting a school board hearing.
This is not the only report of hot sauce being used as a way to discipline children. A number of years ago Sylvia Guadalupe Tagle, 50, was found guilty of child abuse after allowing a special needs student to drink a soda laced with hot sauce, reported NBC.
And last August, Jessica Beagley, 36, was convicted of misdemeanor child abuse after putting hot sauce into her son's mouth because he lied about trouble that he got into at school. The boy recorded the act on video and Beagley is now facing up to one year in jail coupled with a $10,000 fine, according to The Huffington Post.
