The mother of a Stockton, Calif. elementary school student is under arrest for physically attacking her son's school principal over a dress code violation.
Pami Gibbs, 29, allegedly punched Fillmore Elementary School principal Evangelina Ramos several times Monday morning, after Ramos told Gibbs' 9-year-old third-grader that he had to turn his shirt inside-out because it had skulls and crossbones on it.
”If you didn’t know what to look for you’d never see a skull in there; that’s a skateboard mostly what I see," the child's great-grandfather Bill Black told KTXL-TV.
Gibbs faces four charges -- two felonies and two misdemeanors, one of which is for a possible hate crime for causing "injury based at least partly on race," The Record of Stockton reports.
"There were some comments made about ethnicity, yes," police told KTXL-TV. Gibbs is white, Ramos is a Latina. The principal was taken to the hospital bleeding and sustained minor injuries.
Gibbs is being held on bail set at $134,000.
The attack broke out after weeks of stricter dress codes being implemented by Ramos, according to KTXL-TV. Gibbs family members told the station that they believe they were being targeted by the principal based on race, and were required to buy uniforms while other families weren't held to the same expectations.
This incident at Fillmore Elementary is among several other security issues that have arisen at district schools in recent weeks, according to The Record.