GREENE COUNTY — A teacher’s aide accused of attacking a special needs student on the bus is facing charges.
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Tenyetta Olinger, 48, of Fairborn, was indicted last week by a Greene County grand jury on one count of assault and two counts of endangering children, according to Greene County Common Pleas Court records.
Both the Greene County Prosecutor’s Office and Bellbrook Police confirmed to News Center 7 that Olinger is the now-charged suspect in connection with the assault of 8-year-old Nathan Jackson.
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As previously reported by News Center 7, Fairborn resident Dustin Jackson said his son, Nathan, who is nonverbal autistic, was assaulted by a Sugarcreek Academy employee.
Nathan takes a Fairborn City Schools bus to and from Sugarcreek Academy in Bellbrook, which is a Greene County Educational Service Center (ESC) school.
“On January 28, a teacher’s aide from his class really mistreated him getting on the school bus,” Jackson said.
Jackson shared photos of Nathan that he took the same day. He had a black eye and a swollen knot on his forehead.
According to the police report, a teacher’s aide told an officer that the employee allegedly grabbed the boy’s wrist, then lifted him by his harness straps and “muscled” him into the seat.
The aide continued and said the accused employee threw the child “into his seat with such force that he struck his head his head against the window and cried out in pain,” the report read.
Jackson told News Center 7’s John Bedell that on-board bus cameras caught how the injuries happened on video.
“The (Bellbrook Police Department) detective said the footage was so disturbing that they recommended we not watch it because we may not be able to unsee what we see,” Jackson said.
News Center 7 filed a public records request with Fairborn City Schools for a copy of that bus surveillance video. The district denied the request citing federal student privacy laws.
According to the report, Sugarcreek Academy Principal Mike Doll told police that the female employee, later identified as Olinger, was put on administrative leave while the school conducts its investigation.
Greene County Educational Service Center (ESC) Superintendent Terry Graves-Strieter previously declined to comment on this investigation saying, “It is our general procedure that we do not discuss personnel matters with the media.”
Fairborn City Schools declined to comment on the investigation.
Olinger is scheduled to make her first court appearance next month, according to court records.
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