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Molino Church Daycare Worker Facing Child Abuse Charge For Allegedly Biting A Child
June 17, 2022
A church worker daycare has been charged with child abuse after allegedly biting a child.
Haley Nicole Gunn, age 30 of Century, was booked into the Escambia County Jail for third degree felony child abuse without great bodily harm and misdemeanor battery. She was released from jail on a $6,000 bond.
According to the Escambia County Sheriff’s Office, Gunn bit a child under her care Tuesday in the daycare at CrossFaith Church on Highway 29 in Molino.
ECSO said security video shows the young victim bite another child. Gunn went to the child, grabbed her left arm and bit her, according to an arrest report. The video shows Gunn then check on the other child before picking up the victim and looking at her arm, the report continues.
Gunn stated that the child had bitten other children on two prior occasions. She told deputies that she had been given permission by the parents to physically discipline the child by slapping her on the hands or on the thigh, but the child’s guardian denied that was true.
The child had a visible bite mark wound with bruising, the report states.
The guardian told deputies that Gunn was apologetic, but she was fired from her job.
Many of Gunn’s statements to law enforcement were redacted from a report obtained from the State Attorney’s Office.
The Florida Department of Children and Families is also investigating.
Comments
49 Responses to “Molino Church Daycare Worker Facing Child Abuse Charge For Allegedly Biting A Child”
I think if a child has a problem with biting, they should be removed from the daycare until the issue is resolved. No, she shouldn’t have bitten the child- the mother should have already done that. The other children should not have to worry about another child biting them. Unfortunately, some children are bad biters. Their parents need to find alternative care until they grow out of that stage. I think the young lady probably needs to find a new line of work, but I don’t think abuse charges are in order.
So I’ve read through ALL of the comments and I can see why this world is so messed up. It isn’t because someone is biting or someone is being charged. It’s because we as a society are so against one another. Jeez. I was a biter and was bitten by my mother so hard it left a mark. Funny thing, I’ll still bite today. So that didn’t work. I will say the day care worker shouldn’t have bitten someone else’s child. That’s wrong. Should she be charged for child abuse? I don’t believe so. There are children out there that are being abused terribly. This doesn’t really fall under that category. The parents could simply remove the child from this day care and try another one. I have three kids. I don’t know if I would have taken it this far. But, to each their own.
Period point blank, a child doesn’t know any better, but an ADULT DOES. It was not her job to personally take it upon herself to discipline the child her way. She should have gone through the correct channels and carried out the daycare’s procedures on something like that happening- report it to her boss and the parents and write an incident report documenting the child biting other children. There’s no excuse for this woman’s actions whatsoever and if it was y’all’s child y’all would be handling it the exact same way if not taking it further than these parents are. The audacity of some of y’all floors me.
That is how dogs do it. It is good enough for us.
Oh gosh..can’t believe how times have changed.
When I was raising my kids I learned quickly that s child that bites usually keeps doing it till they themselves get bit.
But..parenting today is so much different.
And that’s a big problem with today’s society. Kids really h a very no immediate reprisal for there actions.
If they get punished at all.
I’m getting my laugh out today !!!! Everyone is upset in one way or another !!!! The younger crowd says she should go to jail!!!! The older crowd say that was the way we were raised!!!HERE IS THE BOTTOM LINE!!! Raise your kids your self !!! If you can’t raise them yourself DONT have kids !!!!! Don’t tell me oh we can’t make it both of us have to work !!!! That’s crap!!! I came from a family of 11 guess what my mother never held a job outside the home !!!! We did fine never cold never wet and always had a hot meal !!! People today have no clue to parenting !!! They actually think by having children it ok to send them to someone else to be raised!!! As far as the person who bite the kid that would have never happened if the parents did what they were supposed to do!!!! RAISE YOUR OWN CHILDREN!!!!!!
It is hilarious how these “WOKE” parents defend their discipline -free upbringing of their precious offspring. How is it working out for YOU, or more to the point for SOCIETY ?
Should have kicked the kid out of day care and let the parents lose their jobs instead.
Well here’s the thing, if the child was a problem and a biter then the day care should have refused to watch the child until the PARENTS took care of it themselves! But no they left it up to a non-family member, a community member, because hey! Who wants to be responsible these days? You can judge by the comments here alone there are people who defend these actions. I don’t care if you were raised in the 60s, 50s or 1850s… this type of discipline is not acceptable. Biting a toddler… really that’s okay to most of you? Bruising is okay with most of you? I’d hate to be any of your kids. I’ve only had to spank both my kids twice in their lives and it was because they were about to get seriously hurt. They’ve graduated, good grades, no drugs, not sexually active and absolute stunners… I didn’t need the church, or the community, the internet, or DCF to raise my children, it’s just called good parenting.
@Matchbox I think you and everyone else are missing the point. You are welcome to do whatever you want with YOUR child. That’s your business. This is not about “wimpy parents.” It’s about overstepping your boundaries and disciplining someone else’s child. I can bite mine if I want to. But that is MY child. You bite mine, and jail would be like a vacation. Just because all of you boomers got bitten to teach you a lesson means nothing. Chances are it was YOUR OWN PARENTS DOING THE BITING; not a daycare worker. Regardless if she was told she could discipline her, she shouldn’t have.
Not. Her. Child.
My child used to bite. Until I bit her so hard she never bit again.. this is what is wrong with these hateful spoiled and entitled kids these days..no consequences..wimpy parents
I don’t like how people who give excuses for abusers and enablers on this thread try to normalize unacceptable behavior and discipline.
If you are hitting women, men, children, whoever– you’re doing it wrong.
Learn grace within.
“Spare the teeth, spoil the child”
BT, 06/17/22; 12:47pm
This is is the funniest thing I’ve read in a fortnight.
FYI it isn’t the 40’s 50’s or 60’s. No wonder the world is messed up when people are stuck in the past and refuse to learn anything new. You probably still have lead paint in your homes and say “that’s how I was raised”… The lead caused your learning disabilities. Am I right? Ask your Doctor.
It does work….BUT the caregiver shouldn’t have been the one to bite someone else’s child call the parents and let them handle it I don’t think she’s a monster at all but she was wrong if she bit mine I would’ve been furious and permission to slap on the hands or the thighs is a far cry from biting a bruise on someone else’s baby.
I think those of you that are citing “child development” and telling others they are “uneducated” are nuts. As long as I love and care for my child in every loving way possible, teach them right from wrong, bring them up in a clean healthy environment, make sure they get a good education and to love the Lord, you “child development” people can mind your own business or kiss my grits! I’m a Boomer and there was NO BETTER childhood to grow up in. No teacher or anyone else is going to tell me how to raise my children but Mom and grandmother, of course. AND children biting other people do it because it hurts PERIOD! Give me a break on the “teething”. Kids cry when their teething, they don’t look for someone to bite. That is pure hogwash. If someone else’s kid did that under my care, I would separate the child from the others and CALL THEIR PARENTS TO PICK THEM UP. This girl was wrong! I think Law Enforcement handled it fine.
It works. You don’t have to bite hard. Primitive babies require primitive teaching.
MAN! We’d all be in jail for this back when we were raising our kids. This is exactly what your parents taught you to do when your child bites and I have to say IT WORKS! It’s not like she bit the child’s arm off! I do not know this girl at all, but treating her like a hard core criminal seems a little harsh when you consider the situation.
IF the parents gave her permission to do this – shame on you though because that is your responsibility to teach your child right from wrong no matter the situation, not someone else.
That is what’s wrong with our world today, noone believes in disciplining their children-look where that’s gotten us – a bunch of spoiled entitled generation of overgrown brats!
This is ridiculous!
Would I do this to someone elses’s child -absolutely not and I wouldn’t want anyone doing this to my children either, but I think this is blown way out of proportion!
@Leighann have you lost your ever loving MIND???
I feel like a lot of these comments have taken a sip from the same Kool aid. Nobody is arguing against disciplining a child, but I’m now way shape or form should a grown adult be BITING children and toddlers!!!
If your parents did that to you then you were abused and it was normalized to a point where your ignorant to child development.
People are really justifying biting children and that’s INSANE
And for context I got whooped as a child for behaving badly, but God better help whatever adult that would dare try to BITE ME. Some of y’all had bad parents.
How about a time out and having the parent remove the child? Put the responsibility on the parent.
this is a terrible situation all around and the truth on the incident will come to light. I agree with Shelby
How about just taking the child back to the parent?
I agree with Shelby. She’s NOT a monster.
Spare the teeth, spoil the child
Y’all people that think this is okay are absolutely insane. She bit a baby, a tiny defenseless baby. I have read all of your comments saying my momma bit me and I stopped biting, for you to remember this you had to be 3-5 years old. This baby is barely over a year old and she left a huge purple bruise of her entire mouth on this baby’s arm. The fact that she was angry enough to bite a baby that hard and not smart enough to walk away and get another teacher is disgusting. Even if the parents “told her it was okay” she works in a daycare licensed by DCF and has to have DCF trainings before becoming a daycare teacher, she knew that this wasn’t okay.
Y’all are SICK asf if you think for one min that it was okay for that lady to bite that baby !! On NO circumstance should that women had ever bit or put her hands on any of those babies ! she was a BABY ! I get the whole your child bites so bite them back but that’s not her damn child and she had NO right to do that PERIOD !! And no mother should ever have to feel what that mother feels like for her child to be mistreated when they thought she was in good hands !
You know why that child bit children in that daycare? Because there wasn’t enough SUPERVISION no other reason completely the adults in charge faults. Too many children or not enough daycare workers it’s one of the two. Anything else is just an excuse.
All of you defending Haley sound like the parents of criminals “my baby would never do that”.
The others that are blaming this on discipline, “well my mother bit me and I stopped biting”….EXACTLY, your MOTHER NOT A DAYCARE WORKER.
Haley did it. She wasn’t given permission by anyone to bite that toddler.
The message from Haley to the mother, “I swear on everything I love and have, I’ll never do that again, I’m so sorry”. Yea, that’s not an innocent woman by any stretch.
Get your heads on straight and remember how you’d feel if it was your child.
She should have known better. These day you do anything to anybody and think it’s ok.
To all you “my moms did it too me” if your mother disciplined you with a hot clothes iron I guess that would be acceptable to you as well? Even if it’s not think about this it wasn’t the Childs Mother who disciplined the child for this it was a daycare worker a random daycare worker NOT THE PARENT.
Don’t lay your hands/mouth (especially in today’s world where people still die from covid) on someone else’s child I was taught that by my mother a lesson some of you seem to forget.
Being raised in the 60’s, I bit and I got bit back, Never did it again.
If you read the comments above, it is completely clear why most of today’s children and parents alike are completely self-centered, spoiled, entitled, uncontrollable members of society. I don’t know how har she bit the child, but good for her, for attempting to teach a child that biting hurts and shouldn’t be done. I guess it would be better if the child went their whole childhood not learning that only to pop off at the wrong person one day and then end up with worse than a bite mark? I was not “beat” or “abused” growing up, but i was definitely disciplined and taught how to be an obedient child and not a mean brat. Side note – every kid goes through it, and maybe the parents are disciplining at home, but shame on them for not handling this differently. Unless the kid required medical attention, this is ridiculous. In today’s society, you can’t do this anymore, and I myself wouldn’t do it to someone else’s child, but it doesn’t make it wrong.
“Discipline” today is really not discipline. Those of us who were born in the 40’s had a different discipline system than the so-called system used today. We knew when we had done something wrong and we knew we were going to get a spanking and probably would not repeat what we had done. Parents were in charge back then unlike what is happening today (government in charge)
For the grown adults that are unfortunately uneducated on child development, do you know why babies/toddlers bite? If you think it is out of malice, well that explains a lot. Their teeth are literally growing in and when that is happening they feel instant relief when biting down on something. Do you also think they should get disciplined when they have an accident and can’t make it to the potty in time? Our brains do not become fully functioning until age 25 . . . Let me say that louder for the people in the back AGE 25. So, just the fact alone you think that a baby is going to know the difference in right or wrong is beyond me. What other relationship in your life is physical abuse okay? . . . I’ll wait . . . Oh there isn’t one. When you come into work late does your boss hit you . . . No. So, why resort to physical discipline on someone that can not do anything to defend themselves. Our babies love us more than anything in the world, they love us through our good, bad, and ugly days. Give them the effort in raising them that you should have gotten when you were a kid. Prayers being sent to this family.
It’s really disgusting how some of you are taking up for this woman. Regardless of if she got “permission” from the parent or not, biting a child is never okay nor acceptable. What was she even thinking??! This is exactly why my children do not and will not go to daycare. People tend to feel as if they can do anything to someone else’s child and that type of thinking is disgusting.
@EMD I Also agree!!!!!!
Y’all are out your minds if you think that child’s mother told a grown woman to bite her child like that. Disgusting
@ EMD….
Touché
Y’all that’s are saying good for her for biting the kid are off your rockers!! I swear to the good lord that if ANYONE other than my husband or myself puts their hands on our children let alone their DIRTY MOUTHS jail will be the least of their worries! Shane on her for thinking is okay to physically punish someone else child! She’s must’ve hit her head. And mawmaw and pawpaw that agree with this y’all grew up LONG ago when thing were much different. This is NOT how things are done now.
Look how today’s NON discipline is working! I was raised in the forties and fifties and this was an effective form of discipline for biting. I know my mother loved me and she bit me to show me how it feels. I never bit anyone again. Are we raising a generation of little tyrants!? I do not know this woman. So that has nothing to do with it. I have not attended this church in many years, so that has nothing to do with it either.
The fact that some of you are taking up for her is mind blowing!!!!!!!!
I don’t care if permission was given this is a 30 year old attacking a 15 month old. I ask how bad could the child have bit they only have 4 teeth. Whether or not the child was a biter she/he did not deserve being yanked up by Her/his arm and then to be bitten by someone the child trusted beside their parent. $6,000.00 wasn’t high enough of a bond she should have paid more or had no bond. I know one thing if it had been my child she wouldn’t be around my child or any other child again including our elderly.
You know when the Sweet lady that use to run this place was there..You never heared of any issues..Seems like the new people running the show now care more about the money and business aspect of this day care instead of….Well obviously children saftey.
Also come on man if i said “Hey if you want you can throw my kid out of a tree” somewhere in your adult brain it would say “yeah im not gonna do that even if the parents said I could” Or so you would think…
It looks like a moment of frustration led to Haley making a mistake, guardian permission or not.
I have and still do trust her around my grandchildren.
A rough period but you will be ok Haley.
Like everyone else has said biting a child who is a biter, they usually will stop when they get bite. Maybe nipping would be a better word than biting. Of course I was raised up in the 50’s and 60’s.
She is the adult. A child is a child.
I know these things aren’t allowed, she shouldn’t have done this even is she had permission. But, I will say, I was a biter at a very young age, my Mom did that to me, I never bit again! She may have taken care of a bad habit for that child! Of course that has been 50+ years ago before everything became offensive to others!
Biting back definitely would cause the brat to stop biting other kids. But in today’s society disciplinary action is no longer allowed. The parents of the bitten children should file charges against the parents of the brat, who condone their child’s bullying other kids
All truth will come to light if anyone knows haley they all know she wouldn’t DO ANYTHING TO A CHILD UNLESS THE PARENTS SAID TO. She is one the few people I trust my children to . It’s messed up how one the parents don’t want to own up to what thier part of the story but all will be shown during court.