Day-care assistant accused of hitting child with ruler
A day-care teacher’s assistant in Apopka is accused of hitting a 4-year-old with a ruler hard enough to leave a bruise, police said. Janet Gainer, 54, faces a charge of child abuse without great bodily harm.
An employee who answered the telephone Friday at Learning Tree Academy on Votaw Road declined to comment and said that she did not know whether Gainer is still employed at the facility.
The day care’s parents’ handbook says that “physical punishment is not allowed on the premises by staff or any other person,” records show.
The 4-year-old had two square-shaped bruises about the same size as the ruler, which police photographed, records show.
The child’s guardian contacted the police Monday, records show.
The child told the guardian at pickup that Gainer had used a yardstick, but the 4-year-old’s description of the device sounded more like a ruler, police said.
Gainer told police that the child was hitting other children with a shoe and also had hit a teacher.
The child ran and hid under a table, she said.
Gainer said that she told the child that it hurts other people when you hit them, and demonstrated by grabbing the 4-year-old’s hand and “popping” it, police said.
But the bruises on the child’s arm looked more consistent with being hit by a ruler, police said.
Gainer was arrested on Thursday and was released from the Orange County Jail at about 2 a.m. on Friday on a $2,500 bond.