Mom facing mixed reaction after having misbehaving son 'arrested'

A Georgia mother says she never wants her son to be in trouble with the law.
So after hearing he was misbehaving at school, she showed him what it would feel like, with some help from police officers.

"Being disrespectful at any age to anyone now could get you killed," said Chiquita Hill, the Georgia mother of three.

Calling the police to her Columbus home to teach her son a lesson wasn't her first choice.

"We sat down, we talked about it. I asked him, 'What's going on? How are you feeling?'"

She said her son Sean had been acting out in school, disrespecting his teacher and refusing to do school work.

Hill explained the behavior was going on for weeks and talking through it just wasn't working.

"He's going through the phase right now, it's just in one ear out the other," she said.

That's when she called the police in hopes of scarring him straight.

She says she is scared that not obeying his teacher could escalate into disrespect for authority as an adult, something she believes could be life-threatening.

"I'm scared for when they get older, how bad is it going to be?" she said.

Hill says when cops arrived they talked to her about what the arrest simulation would be like, making sure she was okay with everything. Then they entered the house, talked to Sean about his behavior, put handcuffs on him, and then sat him in the back of a squad car for about five minutes.

Hill posted photos of the experience to her Facebook page and she's received more than 3,500 likes, 1,000 shares, and hundreds of comments.

One commenter referenced the situation in Baltimore saying, "I don't like this, in a lot of cities police really do handcuff young children."

But many showed support for Hill's decision.

"I had black cops arrest me when I was 15 and love them for it," another commenter wrote. "I wouldn't be who I am today. "

Child psychologist Dr. Angela Sims who says finding the cause of misbehavior is just as important as correcting the defiance.

"If it's a one time occurrence you address the behavior and then you might just move on and there might be nothing else, but if it's an on-going kind of thing, and it's happening more than a couple times, then yeah, you need to find out what's going on."

Hill said she hopes this simulated arrest will teach her son a lesson.

"It's hard for a black male now, and I just want him to grow up to be successful and to be respectful," she said.