WSMV Channel 4 Molestation alleged at Head Start

Molestation alleged at Head Start

The Dickson Police Department is investigating allegations that a 5-year-old girl was molested at the Head Start program she attends.

Dickson's police chief Ricky Chandler has assigned a detective to the case, who is interviewing witnesses and the potential suspect at the Highland Rim Head Start program. Chandler said the teacher has agreed to take a polygraph exam.

 "It's the preliminary stages of the investigation. We don't have all the facts yet. We're trying to get to the bottom of it," Chandler said.

Channel 4 news will not identify the mother of the child, in order to protect the child's identity. The mother says her daughter told her over the weekend that she had been molested.

"We were in the tub, and I was washing her, and she said, 'She hurt me.' She blurted it out, and I said, 'She hurt you?  Who?' And she said, 'It's sore, Mommy,'" the child's mother told Channel 4.

"She told me everything, that it's been happening at school. I'm livid," the mother said.

 Chandler says the Head Start program has two teachers in the classroom at all times, a teacher and an assistant teacher, and that the classrooms are video taped.

 "Their IT person has told us they should be able to go back to the beginning of the year and see if the teacher ever left the room," Chandler said. The chief says they are also checking attendance records at the school.

 Chandler says a forensic specialist brought in by DCS interviewed the girl Wednesday, but that the girl did not disclose anything. Chandler says the detective will continue talking to witnesses.

 Highland Rim Head Start is not commenting.

 According to the police chief, the teacher has been taken out of the classroom.

 No one has been charged in connection with the allegations.

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