Surveillance footage captured the moment the food was fished from a trash bin at a primary school, and handed back to the young black girl. Photo / WKYC
Surveillance footage captured the moment the food was fished from a trash bin at a primary school, and handed back to the young black girl. Photo / WKYC
Shocking video has captured the moment an Ohio primary school lunch lady forced a young girl to eat a waffle she had thrown in the rubbish bin in a disturbing incident that has sparked a lawsuit.
The 9-year-old student was made to finish her meal after she threw her waffle into the bin.
Despite not wanting to eat it, lunch lady Monika Sommers-Fridenstine fished the waffle out of the rubbish and forced the 9-year-old to eat it.
To make matters worse, the principal saw what was unfolding and stood by and did nothing, according to the civil rights lawsuit.
Footage has since been released of the disgusting incident that happened in December.
"We see in this video, she throws her lunch away like thousands of students do across the country do every day," said Jared Klebanow, the lawyer representing the girl's family.
"For one reason or another, this monitor pulls the waffle from the garbage, holds it out like she doesn't even want to look at it or see it, wipes it off with a napkin and hands it back to the student and forces her to eat it."
The 9-year-old is African-American, while the lunch lady was white.
Surveillance footage captured the moment the food was fished from a trash bin at a primary school, and handed back to the young black girl. Photo / WKYC
Klebanow, who filed the lawsuit in US District Court for the Northern District of Ohio on December 8, questioned whether the incident was racially motivated.
"Hundreds of Caucasian children have thrown away their lunches at Palm Elementary school and, upon information and belief, have never been required to eat food pulled from the garbage," the lawsuit states.
The lunch monitor and Principal Deborah Pustulka, who is also white, were fired on December 16 after the school district investigated the incident.
Former school Principal Deborah Pustulka (pictured) was fired after she watched the incident unfold and didn't intervene. Photo / Lorain City Schools
The unidentified girl's mother, LaTosha Williams, said her daughter simply didn't like the waffles.
That wasn't good enough for Sommers-Fridenstine, who "crossed her arms and looked at [the girl]" until she ate the waffles, her classmates looking on", according to the lawsuit.
Fridenstine told her to "go sit down" and that she "would be required to eat the waffles dug out of the garbage," the lawsuit added.
Klebanow said that Sommers-Fridenstine "scared" and "intimidated" the student into eating the waffle while Pustulka was in "eyeshot".
