Ma insists teen was the bully in school brawl
A BROOKLYN mother accused of egging her daughter on in a playground brawl — and then stepping in and assaulting a teenager — says she’s guilty of nothing more than defending her kid from a longtime bully.
Tameekah Douglas-Stanbury, 38, was hit with assault charges on March 12 for participating in the Feb. 15 fracas — which witnesses captured on cell phone video — on the Roy H. Mann Middle School playground.
The Mill Basin mom rejected a deal from prosecutors Wednesday at Brooklyn Criminal Court that would require her to undergo anger management.
“My client’s daughter was viciously assaulted in a schoolyard by the complaining witness. She’s denying that she committed any crime,” said Jay Schwitzman, Douglas-Stanbury’s lawyer.
Widely circulated footage of the melee released last month showed two teen girls fighting on the Mill Basin school’s playground. Douglas-Stanley can be seen stepping in at one point, pulling the braids of Renee Tenpow’s 13-year-old daughter.
New video of the altercation that the Daily News obtained appears to show the younger Tenpow laying into Douglas-Bradley’s daughter on the playground in the moments before the escalation, which Schwitzman said proves she was simply defending her daughter.
“When your child’s getting assaulted, you’re allowed to defend yourself — and your child and a third person,” he said. “She didn’t cause any injury to anybody.”
Schwitzman also provided photos Tenpow’s daughter sent to Douglas-Stanley’s daughter, in which she is holding a knife.
“Don’t play,” an accompanying message naming DouglasStanbury’s daughter reads. The message also contained gun and knife emojis.
Tenpow’s attorney, Sanford Rubenstein, who filed a $5.5 million notice of claim against the city and the Department of Education on April 2 for failing to protect Tenpow’s daughter, said the new footage is null and void.
He said it has “no relevance whatsoever” to the charges pending against his client.
“You have no right to assault a 13-year-old child,” Rubenstein said.