Muskogee Junior High Student Taken Into Custody For Missing Too Much School

Thursday, December 13th 2018, 7:03 pm

By: News On 6

A Muskogee Junior High student was taken into custody for missing too much school.

The student's mom said her son is embarrassed after an officer showed up at school and handcuffed him in front of his friends. Stephanie said her 14-year-old son was taken to Muskogee's Child Intervention Center this week.

She said when her son was released, he told her he'd been handcuffed in front of his classmates at Alice Robertson Junior High.

"He comes out and the first thing he says is, 'Mom, my wrists hurt.’ … and I said, Why? And he said, 'The handcuffs were tight.'," said Stephanie.

She said the school told her he was taken into custody for truancy.

"He's pretty quiet, even with me. But I can tell he's embarrassed," said Stephanie.

She said her son hasn't missed all of the days the school claims, but the district said they'd only do something like this in an extreme case.

"This is a last resort, this is the last thing we want to have happen," said Muskogee Schools Spokesman Steve Braun.

Braun said tickets are only issued when a student misses four or more days of school in a four week period.

"We want our students to be in school. They can't learn if they're not there," Braun said.

He said they only take this kind of action when they can't reach the parent and he said reports the student was arrested are false.

"It's more just taken into custody in a sense," said Braun."Handcuffing is a safety precaution if they're going to be put into a patrol car."

But the handcuffing is Stephanie's biggest issue with the whole situation.

"It's ridiculous that they feel threatened by a 14-year-old child that hasn't done anything to anybody," said Stephanie.

The district wouldn't say exactly how many days the student missed, and his mother was unclear how many days the school said he missed. The district said they plan on working to improve communication with parents to avoid situations like this in the future.