Florida daycare worker seen slapping, tossing toddlers around in disturbing surveillance footage
A Florida daycare worker has been arrested and charged after surveillance video captured her beating the children and throwing them around. According to WESH, Katherine Weitz's abuse of the children at the Dream City Academy in Ormond Beach, Central Florida, was discovered after a manager at the center began developing suspicions on how the kids were being treated.
The manager reportedly heard the toddlers crying and checked the surveillance footage, which showed the 65-year-old Weitz regularly hitting, pushing, throwing, and slapping the children, and raised a complaint with the police. The Ormond Beach Police Department said the footage showed Weitz alone with six toddlers, the oldest just two-years-old, on May 23, at around nap time. They said the children appeared restless and the 65-year-old repeatedly used force to make them behave.
Speaking about the abuse, Keith Walker, an officer with the OBPD, detailed some of the disturbing footage captured on camera. "There was shaking (and) a couple of kids being smacked during nap time," he said. "Some of the kids, she palmed the back of their heads with her hands and pushed them face forward in their cots," he continued. "She would take them by their wrists and their ankles, and she would flip them facing over in the opposite direction so they wouldn't be facing another child."
"We found over 30 incidents that could be considered child abuse to at least four different children," Walker revealed, adding, "It's very disturbing to drop off your child in the care of somebody else, to think that they are going to be protected."
WESH reported that there was no indication that any of the toddlers abused by Weitz suffered any kind of permanent injury, though parents are still said to be outraged over her behavior and wish to press charges to ensure she does not work with children in the future.
The OBPD said Weitz told them she hit the children because she woke up with a headache and thought about calling in sick, but instead went into work and had no patience with them. She reportedly agreed that what she saw on the video was her, "over-reacting, being too rough."
It was only the 65-year-old's third day on the job as a full-time employee at Dream City Academy, and police said she had passed a full background check before she was hired. Weitz has been charged with felony child abuse in connection to the incidents and was released from custody after posting a $30,000 bond. She is scheduled to be arraigned on Tuesday, June 10.