Officials in the Baltimore school system placed the district’s in-house police chief and two school police officers on leave last week after a video surfaced of one officer kicking, slapping, and swearing at a teenage boy.
Local authorities are conducting a criminal investigation, according to The Baltimore Sun.
School police say the boy and another male youth, who were identified as “outside intruders” before the incident, are not students at REACH Partnership School, but a lawyer for the 16-year-old boy who was hit by the officer says he does attend the school, The Sun reports.
Federal officials are already investigating the city’s police following the death of Freddie Gray, an unarmed black man whose death in police custody sparked unrest in the city last year; the school police department is a separate agency.