Background: The YMCA Tiger Academy in Jacksonville, Fla. where Geanene White formerly worked (Google Maps). Inset: Geanene White (Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office).
A substitute teacher in Florida was fired and arrested after she was accused of trying to “actively encourage” a classroom of children to beat up one of their fellow students.
An arrest report from the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office detailed the alleged events of Feb. 12 that led to Geaneane White, 57, losing her job at the YMCA Tiger Academy in Jacksonville. According to police documents, on that day, White asked her students to get into small groups, but one boy “refused.” As her “frustration grew,” she asked the rest of the children in the class, “Who in here can beat him up?” The arrest report stated, “Four kids raised their hands,” then proceeded one by one to assault the boy, allegedly at White’s urging.
Police documents stated that after the children were done beating up the singled-out child, White allegedly went after the boy herself and “pushed him, causing him to hit the desk” he was sitting in. When police interviewed the boy, he said that White “grabbed him by the collar of his shirt and dragged him,” during which time he “could not breathe,” the arrest report stated. She then “ferociously” yanked the boy down to his seat at his desk, causing him to hit the back of his head on another desk nearby, police said.
White then allegedly asked two other school employees for assistance, telling them that the child “needed behavior intervention.” She did not inform them about her alleged direction to the other children to beat the child up.
But when those employees spoke to other children in White’s classroom, they reportedly told them about the alleged beatings that White “actively encouraged.” At that point, White was “terminated immediately and escorted out.”
Police wrote in the report that the child had a “small laceration” and bruises around his ear.
YMCA Tiger Academy, in a statement to WTLV-WJXX, a local affiliate of NBC and ABC, confirmed that the incident happened and that White’s employment was terminated after an internal investigation. The school added that White had been “properly vetted by both the First Coast YMCA and Duval County Public Schools.”
White was arrested on March 1 and charged with felony child abuse and four counts of contributing to the delinquency of a child. She was released on March 6 after posting bail. Her next court date is scheduled for March 25.
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.
