A parent caught her child's teacher making racist comments after forgetting to turn off her mic on a Zoom call.
Per CNN, Katura Stokes' sixth-grader son, who attends Desert Willow Fine Arts, Science and Technology Magnet Academy in Palmdale in California, had been struggling with learning online during the pandemic.
On January 20, Katura scheduled a Zoom call with the 12-year-old's teacher, Kimberly Newman, to discuss his schoolwork. By the end of the call, the teacher assured him that he was caught up.
However, after the video conference call concluded, the teacher neglected to properly end the Zoom call and made a number of racist comments to someone else off camera.
An outraged Stokes, who is African-American, recorded the white teacher as she proceeded to lambast Stokes for not answering her prior phone call.
Per CNN, Newman stated: "These parents are such f***ing liars. I mean these parents – that's what kind of pieces of s*** they are. Black. She's Black. They're a Black family.
"Your son has learned to lie to everybody and make excuses. To be entitled because you taught him to make excuses that nothing is his fault.
"This is what Black people do. This is what Black people do. White people do it too but Black people do it way more."
Stokes is now suing the school district over Newman's comments, with Stokes' lawyer John C. Taylor telling CNN:
"The horrible comments the teacher made in the video are truly heartbreaking for a mother to hear and for her young son to hear. It's unthinkable that an educator would mock and belittle this family, and there is no doubt that this incident has scarred them.
"All children are entitled to receive an educational experience free of discrimination and this video has demonstrated what minority students often face behind the scenes today."
Meanwhile, Palmdale school district spokesperson David Garcia told CNN that an internal investigation had been launched into the teacher's conduct and that Newman has since resigned.
Garcia told CNN: "This is something we took very seriously and within minutes placed the teacher on paid administrative leave as part of a process involved with such a situation and within days was no longer employed with the district."
