A 12-year-old middle school student says his teacher taped him to his chair and let students push him around during class, NBC New York has learned.
Irel Cuffee has been afraid to return to IS 339 since the incident last Friday, he said in an exclusive interview.
He said the class was taking a math quiz and the teacher became irritated that he had gotten up from his seat several times -- he says to help a classmate.
So she took some tape, stretched it across his chest, "and then she wrapped it around the chair, and again, and she bit it off and she stuck it to me, and she didn't take it off of me," Cuffee said.
His classmates then began pushing him around, he says.
"She was just grinning, not helping me," he said.
Lorena Cuffee told NBC New York that she is furious.
"If it was me, and they came in this house and seen him Duct-taped to a chair, I would have went to jail.... it's OK for teachers to go around Duct -aping kids to chairs now?" she said.
Department of Education spokeswoman Barbara Morgan said the teacher has been reassigned and officials are looking into the case.
No charges have been filed against the teacher, Morgan said.
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