NEW YORK, CMC – A Caribbean American legislator here is facing child abuse charges for allegedly beating her 13-year-old son with a broom stick.
Police said that New York State Assembly woman Diana Richardson, 33, whose mother is from Aruba and father from St. Martin, was arrested and arraigned in a Brooklyn Supreme Court.
Richardson, who represents the 43rd Assembly District in Brooklyn, reportedly beat her unidentified son with the broomstick over his grades.
The son then left home and walked into the nearby 71st Police Precinct station house in the Crown Heights section of Brooklyn, telling cops that his mother hit him on his left arm as discipline over his grades.
The boy was taken to a local hospital for an abrasion to his arm, according to the criminal complaint.
Richardson, who counts her son as her “greatest accomplishment” on her state assembly member biography page, was charged with second-degree assault, endangering the welfare of a child, criminal possession of a weapon and menacing.
The assault charge is a felony, while the others are misdemeanours, said Arlene Muniz, a spokeswoman for the New York Police Department (NYPD).
Richardson was released without bail at her arraignment and is due back in court on January 10, 2017.
The legislator, who is on the ballot for re-election on Tuesday, is said to be a devoted single mother whose only child often accompanies her to political events.