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Last week a photo of an L.W. Higgins High School senior covered in the blood caused his family and community members to be outraged. The school located in the New Orleans suburb of Marrero, La. was surrounded by protesters on Jan 25th.

The incident took place last Thursday, Jan. 24th around 10 a.m. when Jami Coston FaceTime called his mother, Dasuqua Coston and she saw his face swollen and covered in blood.

“I’ve never seen a face dripping like that. It looked like it was coming mostly from his eye. His lip look busted,” Dasuqua told local station WWL-TV.

Coston’s family allege the incident began when a teacher asked why the senior smelled like cigarettes, then asked for him to be searched. Then a Jefferson Parish Sheriff’s deputy stepped in.

“As the deputy was getting close, Jamiah said he took off his jacket and said oh b*****, you wanna fight?” Dasuqua told the news station. “Once he got to Jamiah, that’s when the slamming the putting the arms behind the back and he said he was screaming.”

A fellow classmate captured part of the incident on video that has been circulating on social media. In the video a man is seen on top of Jami, then the two hit the ground.

Then Dasuqua claims the deputy took her son to his office and physically attacked him. “Eye is bust, blood is leaked all over, school shirt is leaking everywhere,” Dasuqua said.

The Jefferson Parish Sheriff’s Office (JPSO) gave a different account of the incident WWL-TV reported.

According to the department’a statement, the situation started when Jami caused a disturbance in his class and then began taking off his jacket to prepare to fight a deputy. The deputy told him to submit to being handcuffed but Jami resisted. This is when the JPSO said the deputy “…escort[ed] him to the ground.”

Department officials said Jami had a minor cut near his left eye and the deputy suffered scrapes to his knee and hand. Jami was then taken to the deputy’s office for paperwork, they claim.

Jami was later taken to Jefferson Parish Jail and arrested for battery on a police officer, resisting an officer, and interfering with an educational facility.

An advocacy group, ReThink, shared a completely different story of the incident.

“While in handcuffs, Jami cussed at the officer at which time he was taken against his will into a room with no camera no witnesses,” the group wrote in a Facebook post. “Jami was so badly brutalized that behind closed doors, students could hear his loud cry of pain. Rather than intervene, teachers refused allow students to support their classmate. They … heard him getting beat up by police over an unproven accusation of smelling like cigarettes.”

The organization alleges Coston wasn’t allowed to file his own incident report and his family wasn’t notified of what happened until he called his mother on FaceTime.

The incident sparked a student-led protest at the school which two fights occurred and one student was arrested, authorities said. Coston’s family is planning to hire an attorney.

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