Texas teacher loses job for rant about McKinney pool party

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http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/texas-teacher-loses-job-for-rant-about-mckinney-pool-party/ar-BBl1a40

 

 

 

A Texas elementary school teacher complained on Facebook about a police officer’s resignation following a chaotic pool party confrontation — and then got booted herself for the venting.

 

“This makes me ANGRY!” Karen Fitzgibbons, a fourth grade teacher at Bennett Elementary School in Wolfforth, wrote in her racist rant Wednesday rant about Cpl. Eric Casebolt of McKinney, Texas

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“This officer should not have to resign. I’m going to just go ahead and say it...the blacks are the ones causing the problems and this ‘racial tension.’ I guess that’s what happens when you flunk out of school and have no education,” she wrote, as reported by KCBD.

Fitzgibbons went on: “I’m almost to the point of wanting them all segregated on one side of town so they can hurt each other and leave the innocent people alone. Maybe the 50s and 60s were really on to something.”

 

She ended her post with the hashtags “#imnotreacist [sIC],” “#imsickofthemcausingtrouble” and “#itwasagatedcommunity.”

Shortly after posting her tirade, which she wrote along with a news article she shared about Casebolt’s resignation, Fitzgibbons deleted her entire Facebook account — but it was too late for the 16-year veteran of the school to back away from the backlash.

Fitzgibbons was “relieved of her duties” due to her “offensive, insensitive and disrespectful” post, the Frenship Independent School District announced Thursday.

 

Fitzgibbons issued an apology Thursday, saying she “let my emotions get the best of me, and instead of taking a deep breath, vented in an inappropriate way.”

 

“As an educator, I do teach my students about treating all people fairly and with dignity,” she wrote. “I regret that my words are now calling that into question. I can, and will, use this situation as a real world example of how emotions and words can cause hurt to others.”

 

Her exit came the day after a Florida high school principal got dismissed for defending Casebolt in a Facebook post, writing: "He was afraid for his life. I commend him for his actions."

Casebolt was suspended, and eventually resigned, after video of police presence at a suburban pool party showed behavior his own boss later deemed “indefensible.”

 

In the video, Casebolt is seen running around and cursing at mostly black teenagers, slamming a bikini-clan 15-year-old girl to the ground and pulling his gun on unarmed teens who ran to the girl’s side.

 

Casebolt was one of a dozen officers responding to a call about teens and adults fighting at a community pool in a well-to-do suburb. The dispute allegedly started when uninvited teens overcrowded the pool and two white women yelled racist remarks at them. Only one teen, 18-year-old Adrian Martin, was arrested, and his charges were quickly dropped.

 

Casebolt has faced death threats and gone into hiding since his resignation, his attorney said.