Kentucky High School teacher talks smack, student punches him, teacher subdues him gets investigated

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A Kentucky teacher who pinned a student to the ground and pulled his hair has a years-long history of violent incidents, according to local reports.

William Bennett was reassigned to “non-instructional duties” at Jefferson County Public Schools following the August incident, in which he was caught on video brawling with student Jamir Strane. Strane was suspended and faces an assault charge.

Now records obtained by WAVE 3 News detail a 1999 incident from when Bennett taught at Hardin County Schools.

Bennett, facing a rowdy class, allegedly grabbed the desk of one disruptive student and threatened him with detention, according an account of the 1999 incident. The student then left the classroom.

“Mr. Bennett caught up with him, grabbed him by the arm,” an assistant principal wrote at the time. “The student jerked his arm away. I told Mr. Bennett I had the student and not to worry. Mr. Bennett grabbed the student again by the arm. The student jerked his arm away again.”

“Mr. Bennett tried to grab the student one more time and missed the student’s arm and got hold of the student’s shirt instead,” the assistant principal went on. “At this time I grabbed Mr. Bennett’s hand and took it off the student. I asked another administrator to take the student while I talked to Mr. Bennett.”

Hardin County Board of Education meeting minutes from 2000 show Bennett was the only certified teacher whose contract wasn’t renewed, the station reported.

In the most recent violent encounter between Bennett and a student, Strane admitted to striking his teacher before the scrap, and claimed Bennett told him he would be “another black boy shot,” in an interview with WAVE 3 News, a local TV station.

The teacher’s remark set the teen off in part because he had been wounded in a drive-by last summer, his mother told another station, WDRB.