3-year-old girl beaten by her teacher: “After days of ordeal…”, the teacher speaks for the first time

Two weeks after the broadcast of the images of a teacher raising her hand to a kindergarten student, the teacher of this kindergarten class finally breaks the silence after her police custody.

It's a gesture that she still can't explain: on September 3, in her class, a teacher from the Paris region raised her hand to a three-year-old girl who was in the middle of a crying fit before spraying her with water.

Heard this Monday, September 16 in police custody by investigators, she decided to speak to our colleagues at France 2 this Tuesday, September 17. “After days of ordeal, I feel relieved to have finally been able give my version of the facts to the investigators" first confides this teacher who explains that she"immediately regretted this unfortunate and wrongful act".

"We discuss allegations"

The teacher also wanted to come back to the other complaint filed for a slap given to a student in 2012. “Concerning the accusations of repeat offenses, we bring up a case from 2012 which did not give rise to a complaint but to a report, and we forget to say that there was an internal investigation during which the student in question admitted to having lied. It is therefore false in my opinion to say that at the time the principal had hushed up the affair,” adds the accused teacher.

For her lawyer, this teacher never hit a student before September 3. “You have the video, and there is nothing else. If tomorrow, someone brings me the proof, then we will discuss it. But today, we are discussing allegations,” declared Me Laurent Hazan, during the 8pm news on France 2. The teacher was facing a chaotic return to school, he claimed, still speaking to our colleagues.

With an overcrowded class, the teacher had suffered a bereavement the day before and was ill. These are elements that, according to him, explain, without justifying, her excessive violence. The little girl, however, did not return to school. A psychiatrist prescribed two months of leave.