A former Orange County school resource deputy who was caught on camera yanking a 13-year-old girl by her hair has been charged with battery.
In November 2019, video showed Deputy Harry Reid, who had been assigned to Westridge Middle School, using excessive force to detain a student by yanking the girl’s hair while she screamed.
Reid was immediately removed from the school pending investigation and fired the same day.
On January 30, the Orange-Osceola County State Attorney’s Office also filed a misdemeanor battery charge against him.
Deputy Harry Reid was immediately removed from Westridge Middle school once the video emerged and fired later the same day – He has now been charged with misdemeanor battery
Deputy Reid forcefully yanked the girl’s head back, causing her to scream as he pushed her
An Orange County sheriff’s deputy Harry Reid faces a battery charge over the way he treated this middle school student in white headwrap during a disturbance in November 2019
Body-camera footage and cellphone videos showed Reid jerking Wilmica Edmond’s head back during a disturbance.
Deputies were called to the Summerset apartments on November 7, 2019, for reports of a fight between a large group of students, reported Orlando Sentinel.
The brawl purportedly stemmed from an ongoing dispute between two female students at Westridge Middle School.
In the body camera video released by the sheriff’s office, a deputy confronts a visibly agitated Edmond in a white headwrap who is being held back by other teens.
He tries to calm her down and instructs her to lean against a patrol vehicle.
‘What’s going on?’ the deputy asked. ‘You’re acting wild, come over here. Relax. Sit down.’
Edmond continues screaming, at which point Deputy Reid intervenes, yelling at her that she was the one stirring up trouble at school.
Reid then pins the girl’s arms behind her back.
‘I’m tired of this s***!’ he shouts as he forcefully grabs the girl by the back of her head and jerks it backwards.
Edmond continues screaming as Reid leads her to his cruiser and forces her into the backseat.
As the crowd of bystanders roars, Reid whips out his baton and orders everyone to back up.
‘This is because you’re silly! You’re all stupid little children!’ he shouts.
Deputy Reid whipped out his baton and screamed at the bystanders, ‘You’re all stupid little children!’ as he dragged 13-year-old middle school student Wilmica Edmond into the police car
Deputy Harry Reid accused Wilmica Edmond, 13, of fighting outside an apartment complex. He pulled her away from other teens and pinned her against a cruiser with ‘excessive force’
Deputy Reid led the wailing Edmond to the back of the cruiser and forced her inside
Edmond was briefly detained before being released to a parent. She was not arrested.
She claims she suffered neck pain and trouble sleeping after the incident, according to ClickOrlando.com.
Orange County Sheriff John Mina said that Reid, who was hired in February 2019, was immediately removed from the school and fired later that day.
He added that an internal investigation was then conducted by the Professional Standards Division and results were sent to the State Attorney’s Office, who made the decision to charge Reid with battery last month.
The second deputy involved in the incident has not been charged.
Mina said that the deputy ‘had the situation under control [and] was trying to deescalate it’ when Reid ‘showed up and actually escalated the situation, and made it worse’.
It is not clear if Reid has been arrested on the charge or issued with a court summons.
The Sherriff’s Office said that Reid had previously been a deputy with the Orange County Sheriff’s Office from 2000 to 2004.
He also worked as a law enforcement officer in North Carolina from 2005 until 2016.
‘There’s no doubt in mind that his actions were excessive and I didn’t see the need for him to put his hands on a middle school child. To me, it looked like he lost control and his actions were totally inappropriate,’ Mina said last year after the video was released.
Orange County Sheriff John Mina was commended for his quick response to the incident
Wilmica Edmond spoke at a news conference about the pain she suffered after the incident
‘I am very upset by what I saw on that video,’ he added.
‘The actions of this deputy appear to violate some of the most important values and expectations that I have set as sheriff. The type of behavior I witnessed on the video and on body worn camera video will not be tolerated.’
Mina’s quick response to the incident was commended by State Rep. Anna Eskamani, an Orlando Democrat, who wrote ‘this is how the school to prison pipeline happens’.
‘Excessive use of force on one student and then verbal insults towards all students,’ she added.
‘Unbelievable and hurts all efforts by police to build community trust.’
The Orange County Sheriff’s Office announced two days after the incident that the policy for arresting children has been updated.
Mina said the review began in September 2019 after a reserve officer arrested two six-year-olds.
‘Anyone arrested or detained under the age of 13, unless there is a threat of escape or violence, the deputy has to contact a watch commander before they put that juvenile in handcuffs,’ Mina said.