Teacher Accused of Choking Students and Hitting Them on Their Heads

Pembroke Park, FL — Ava Williams, a third-grade teacher at Watkins Elementary School in South Florida, was fired last week after being accused of choking a student. Throughout her two-decade career with Broward County Public Schools, she has also been accused of twisting ears and hitting the back of the heads of her students.

An investigation about the incident was launched by the school administrators after the parents of a student, who Williams reportedly choked, complained about it. Another student said he witnessed the teacher grabbing him around the neck and choking him while yelling, “Do you hear me?”

The alleged choking incident, which happened September 14, was witnessed by only one student as the other students were waiting outside the classroom at that time. The students, however, told Richard Orzech, a detective with the Broward District Schools’ special investigative unit, that they were used to Williams yelling and being mean.

Williams, who is 55-years old, has been working in the Broward County Public Schools since 1998. She has already been accused of twisting a student’s ear and hitting students at the back of their head in 2013 and 2015.

After an investigation into the September incident, Williams was fired but wasn’t criminally charged since the Broward Sheriff’s Office Child Protective Investigation Service detective classified the incident as “not substantiated.”

Moreover, Williams denied the accusations and plans to appeal the decision of the school board with a state judge.