School employee hits 6-year-old with autism in head with shoe, MI officials say
.jpg "A school employee accused of hitting a student with autism has pleaded guilty, Michigan prosecutors said.")
A former school employee accused of hitting a 6-year-old student with autism has pleaded guilty, Michigan prosecutors said.
Kimberley Horen was working as a paraprofessional at Forest Park Elementary in October when she took off a student’s shoe and hit them in the head with it, the Macomb County Prosecutor’s Office said in a July 9 news release.
The 55-year-old was fired following an internal investigation at the Eastpointe school, prosecutors said. She has now pleaded guilty to misdemeanor assault and battery on July 8.
“This plea reaffirms our district’s response to remove this individual from the classroom and terminate her employment. This behavior is absolutely not acceptable,” a spokesperson for Eastpointe Community Schools said in a statement.
“My client has no prior criminal history and had no prior disciplinary issues in any job she had ever held,” Horen’s attorney William Barnwell said in a statement to McClatchy News. “She took responsibility in open court during her plea hearing and will fully comply with whatever is ordered by the Court. This incident does not define who she is as a person.”
Horen is scheduled for a pre-sentence hearing on Sept. 19, prosecutors said.
“Paraprofessionals play a vital role in supporting students, particularly those with special needs,” Macomb County Prosecutor Peter Lucido said in a statement. “When that responsibility is not upheld, it is important that there are consequences.”
Prosecutors said Horen’s assault charge can be reduced to an attempted assault charge if she completes one year of probation, anger management counseling and Wyatt’s Law registration, which would enter her into a database that shows people convicted of crimes against children.
Eastpointe is about a 10-mile drive northeast from downtown Detroit.
This story was originally published July 10, 2025 at 10:55 AM.
