A substitute classroom aide at a Northwest Side elementary school is facing felony charges after prosecutors said a CPS security officer watched live on surveillance cameras as she dragged and pushed an 8-year-old nonverbal autistic boy during a three-minute struggle outside a school bathroom.
Melissa Monroy, 48, who prosecutors said worked as a substitute special education classroom aide at Beard Elementary School, 6445 West Strong Street, in Norwood Park, is charged with aggravated battery of a child younger than 13 causing great bodily harm.
Prosecutors said the boy was being escorted to the bathroom by another special education classroom assistant when he became disruptive and collapsed onto the floor in the hallway outside the restroom around 11:13 a.m. on January 29.
At the same time, Monroy was taking a female student to the restroom. Prosecutors said the two aides exchanged students, and the other assistant escorted the girl to the girls’ restroom while Monroy took over with the boy.
Authorities said Monroy first tried to lift the child by his arms, but he resisted. She then allegedly used her feet to push his body, applying pressure to his back with her legs as she moved him toward the bathroom entrance.
Prosecutors said the boy, seated on the floor, was scooted across the hallway on his buttocks. When he grabbed at Monroy’s legs, she stepped away, then continued using her feet to push against his back as he resisted by bracing his legs against the doorway and grabbing at her legs.
She then allegedly pulled away and dragged him across the floor by one leg into the bathroom while his “legs spread like a starfish,” according to a detention filing. Even then, prosecutors said Monroy continued pushing and pulling him toward the bathroom entrance and refused to let him leave, shoving him against a wall “multiple times.”
The child was crying when the incident ended after a male staff member arrived with other students and escorted the boy into the restroom, prosecutors said.
The confrontation, which lasted about three minutes, was recorded on surveillance video, according to prosecutors. A school security officer who witnessed the incident live on a security monitor contacted the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services and, with the assistance of the school’s assistant principal, filed a report with the agency.
After DCFS was notified, prosecutors said, the school informed the boy’s father, who called 911 the following day to make a police report.
Prosecutors said the proper procedure when a special needs student refuses to move is to wait for the child to calm down or seek assistance from other staff members. They said special education assistants are not supposed to force resisting students to move.
The boy later complained of back pain and was taken to Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital for an examination. On February 8, he returned to the hospital after experiencing behavioral changes, vomiting, and what prosecutors described as “a presumed headache.”
Judge Shauna Boliker denied prosecutors’ request to detain Monroy before trial and ordered her released on standard conditions, including no contact with the child.
CPS did not respond to our request for information and comment.
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