NEW ORLEANS (AP) - The Latest on the arrest of a Louisiana teacher at a school board meeting (all times local):
5 p.m.
The Louisiana teacher who was handcuffed and arrested at a school board meeting after questioning the superintendent’s salary is speaking out on Facebook.
In a video on the Louisiana Association of Educators page, Deyshia Hargrave says she’s appalled at her treatment during Monday night’s Vermilion Parish School Board meeting. And she calls on others around the state and nation to go to school board meetings and speak out on important issues.
Hargrave doesn’t address details of Monday night’s incident.
Videos show her questioning her superintendent big salary increase at a time when teachers haven’t been voted a raise in 10 years.
The school board’s president ruled her out of order. She was arrested in a hallway after appearing to comply with a uniformed security officer’s order to leave.
___
3:45 p.m.
Louisiana’s governor says the handcuffing and arrest of a school teacher after she was ejected from a school board meeting “cast a negative light” on the state.
Gov. John Bel Edwards commented during his Wednesday radio show on the arrest of Deyshia Hargrave at Vermilion Parish School Board meeting. Videos show her complying with an officer’s orders to leave just before she was handcuffed. She was ousted after the board president objected to her questioning the superintendent’s salary hike at a time when teachers haven’t had a raise in 10 years.
Edwards, who is married to a teacher and gets support from teacher unions, said he “didn’t see anything that warranted that type of action.”
___
1:15 p.m.
The superintendent of a Louisiana school district says school officials have received hundreds of hate emails and harassing phone calls - including death threats directed at him and his family.
Jerome Puyau (PEE’-yoh) tells The Associated Press the threats started pouring in after videos spread of a teacher being ordered out of a school board meeting in Vermilion Parish - and her subsequent forceful handcuffing and arrest.
Puyau says emails alone total about 1,500. He said a large percentage make direct threats against him and the Vermilion Parish school system staff.
Videos show teacher Deyshia Hargrave being removed from Monday night’s board meeting after complaining about a pay raise for Puyau and a lack of teacher raises. She’s later seen being forcibly handcuffed and hustled out of a hallway.
___
10 a.m.
A Louisiana prosecutor says a teacher who was handcuffed and arrested after she spoke about teacher pay at a school board meeting won’t be prosecuted.
Widely viewed video shows middle school language arts teacher Deyshia Hargrave screaming on the floor as an officer handcuffs her and orders her not to resist.
KATC-TV reports that Hargrave later bonded out of jail on charges of “remaining after being forbidden” and resisting an officer.
Ike Funderburk, the prosecutor and city attorney in Abbeville, Louisiana, tells the station he won’t approve the charges for further proceedings. It wasn’t immediately clear when the charges would be formally dismissed.
Vermilion Parish School Board President Anthony Fontana tells The Advertiser the officer acted appropriately and he stands by him “100 percent.”
___
7:40 a.m.
A Louisiana school board’s offices were temporarily locked down amid death threats from across the world in response to widely viewed video of a teacher screaming while being handcuffed at a school board meeting.
The lockdown happened Tuesday in the school district in south-central Louisiana.
Vermilion Parish School Board President Anthony Fontana tells The Advertiser the threats have come from as far away as South America, Australia and England, as well as other U.S. states. He said they’ve been reported to the FBI and local police.
Middle school language arts teacher Deyshia Hargrave had spoken out about teacher pay at Monday’s meeting, questioning why the school superintendent should get a pay raise when teachers have gone without raises.
The newspaper reports that Superintendent Jerome Puyau’s new contract gives him $148,800 annually. The average teacher salary in the district is about $47,000.
___
5:40 a.m.
A Louisiana teacher who spoke out about teacher pay at a school board meeting was handcuffed by a law officer as she screamed on the floor while the officer tried to gain control of her in a brief struggle.
In dramatic video posted by KATC-TV, the teacher yells at the officer that he’d just pushed her to the ground. The officer orders her to “stop resisting.”
KATC reports that the skirmish involving Deyshia Hargrave, a middle school language arts teacher, and an Abbeville city marshal happened Monday during a meeting of the Vermilion Parish schools.
The station says the teacher had addressed the board about teacher salaries and raises, and school board president Anthony Fontana at one point ruled her “out of order.”
She was then apprehended in the hallway.
Please read our comment policy before commenting.