Joshua Kehm, Texas school cop, fired after body-slamming 12-year-girl in video

The San Antonio Independent School District has fired an officer who was recently caught on camera body-slamming a 12-year-old girl.

Superintendent Pedro Martinez said Monday the district determined the officer, Joshua Kehm, acted inappropriately during the March 29 altercation that was captured on video and quickly went viral online.

“We understand that situations can sometimes escalate to the point of requiring a physical response; however, in this situation we believe that the extent of the response was absolutely unwarranted,” Mr. Martinez said in a statement. “Additionally, the officer’s report was inconsistent with the video and it was also delayed, which is not in accordance with the general operating procedures of the police department. We want to be clear that we will not tolerate this behavior.”

In the clip, the officer is seen lifting Janissa Valdez, a sixth-grade student at Rhodes Middle School, into the air and throwing her to the ground before handcuffing her while she lays motionless.

“You could just hear where she hits the ground. And it’s nothing but concrete, cement,” the girl’s mother, Gloria Valdez, told a CNN affiliate. “She wasn’t moving. She was just knocked out. I wanted answers, and nobody could give me answers.”

The student told NBC News that the incident unfolded as her classmates were gathering to watch a potential fight between her and another student.

“I was going up to her to tell her ’let’s go somewhere else so we could talk,’ but that’s when the cop thought I was going at her,” she said. “I wasn’t going to do anything.”

Bexar County District Attorney Nico LaHood described the footage as “alarming” after it surfaced last week, and the officer was initially put on administrative leave before he ultimately was fired.

“We know that this incident does not define our district police department, which is dedicated to serving and protecting our school community,” Mr. Martinez said. “We all want to make sure this kind of incident does not occur again, and we will seek to identify areas where improvement may be needed.”

Charley Wilkison, the executive director of the Combined Law Enforcement Associations of Texas, told NBC News that the union will assist the officer with “whatever legal representation he needs.”