Insets: Photos provided by Myla Hemingway’s mother, Tamara Hemingway, showing her hair before and after the 2-year-old’s braid was pulled out (WABC/YouTube). Background: Growing Kids Academy in Ocean Township, N.J., where Myla Hemingway went to day care (WABC/YouTube).
A New Jersey mother says she is taking legal action against a day care that has given her no explanation for how her 2-year-old daughter came home last week with one of her “cornrow” hair braids missing from her head — claiming they didn’t know if her child “pulled it out” herself or whether something more nefarious happened.
“You have to use some type of force for a braid to be removed,” Tamara Hemingway told New York ABC station WABC about her daughter, Myla, and what happened to her.
“It was a cornrow so it was braided down to her scalp,” Hemingway said. “There’s no way that, I don’t know who could have done it, but I know for a fact she or a kid would not have done that.”
The mom told WABC she was furious after seeing her child come home from the Growing Kids Academy in Ocean Township last week with the missing braid. A worker from the school had notified her that she thought a braid was missing but wasn’t sure, so she sent Hemingway a photo to confirm.
“That’s when I saw the big bald spot on my child’s head with the braid missing,” Hemingway said. “They’re supposed to notify me. Just to even, like, give whatever little information you do have about the incident until you look into it further and confirm. But no one even called me to just let me know that little bit of information.”
Hemingway’s lawyer, Marc Caswell, told WABC that what troubles him most about the case is that the facility allegedly “deflected” and told his client “various different things” about what possibly happened, including placing the blame on Myla.
“They didn’t know if her child pulled it out,” Caswell said. “They didn’t know what happened at first, they said that they had no idea that it even happened.”
More from Law&Crime: ‘Never see daylight ever again’: Family tears into ‘foul, disgusting’ boyfriend who stabbed woman 24 times
Hemingway has since removed her daughter from the day care and says the youngster is now sensitive to people touching her hair after the incident.
“I’m very upset and I’m very frustrated because this is my child,” she told WABC. “She’s not able to let me know what happened. And that’s the concerning part, the fact that they’re just so insensitive. No one even called me to check on her, see how she was doing.”
Caswell and Hemingway did not elaborate on what legal action they would take against Growing Kids Academy and its staff, only that they would file a lawsuit. A day care worker told Law&Crime on Wednesday that no one was available to speak about what’s being alleged.
The female staffer was asked if she knew anything about the situation and said: “All I know is it’s unsubstantiated. That nothing’s been found.”
Attempts by Law&Crime to reach Caswell and Hemingway for comment were unsuccessful.
Love true crime? Sign up for our newsletter, The Law&Crime Docket, to get the latest real-life crime stories delivered right to your inbox.
