A Texas mother who filmed herself posing as her 13-year-old daughter to sn*ak into her middle school and attend classes for a day, cla*ms she was did the stunt to prove that security was poor. Casey Garcia, 30, was ar-rest*d Friday for criminal t**spa**ing, ta*peri*g with government records and an unrelated tra**ic vi!lation, according to El Paso County Ja!l records, after a video of her sne-aking into her daughter’s middle school went viral.
In the video, Garcia can be seen walking into the building, which was later identified as the Garcia-Enriquez Middle School. ‘Do I look like a seventh grader?’ she asks before stepping inside.
‘No? Cool, awesome.’ Garcia then appears to say hello to what she says was the principal of the building, and proceeds to walk around the school without teachers noticing. One can even be he-ard giving her instructions to find a classroom.
In second pe*iod, Garcia shows the camera a math assignment, and the teacher can be heard calling her by her daughter’s name, ‘Julie.’ She can then be seen attending physical education class.
By lunch time she takes off her mask to eat. ‘I’ve been here all day, face to face with teachers,’ she said in di*be!ief.
It wasn’t until the final per-iod of the day, she said, that a teacher noticed that Garcia was not who she said she was and con*ronted her. In a follow-up video the mother explains why she did it.
‘We need better security at our schools, this is what I tried to prove, and I don’t mean to be c*rt but I kind of feel like I proved it,’ she said.
It was a social experiment Garcia said as she described wearing fa*e tanner, and dying her hair a da*ke* color to better resemble her daughter’s, and she said she memorized her daughter’s ID number to gain access to the building.
‘I think the deal br**k*r for me was actually walking in and posing as a seventh gr-ader.’ she said. ‘I mean I’m no spring chi*ken, but it wasn’t ha*d and I made it to all seven per-iods.’
In particular, Garcia says she was surprised by the lack of attention teachers were paying to the students.
‘The teachers were so preoccu!ied about the students who were online that they weren’t paying attention to the students who were there physic-ally,’ Garcia said.
Many, she said, were simply concerned that she had her phone out. ‘It was “hey, put your phone away.” I was not a name, I was not a person,’ she said. ‘I was “hey put your phone away.”‘
In response to both her ini!ial video and follow-up which garnered more than 126,000 and more than 105,000 views on YouTube respectively, many appeared to agree with the mother.
‘I remember been in high school and seen people that graduated last year walking around in the hallways that have no reason been there,’ wrote Flor Pardo. ‘Our schools do need more security.’
‘I find it sad they didn’t notice, because they didn’t really inter-act with you,’ commented Aaron Se*ton. ‘You can hear in your voice and ma*neri*ms you’re not a child they just don’t care! Something needs fixed,’ wrote Danay White. ‘Thank you for doing this!’
The El Paso County Sheriff’s office said school officials first notified of the i!cide*t June 1. San Elizario Schools Superintendent Jeannie Meza-Chavez acknowledged what happened.
‘While there was a bre-ach in security by an individual associated as a parent with the school…we want to assure you that our security mea-sures are being reviewed and evaluated,’ she told KTSM.
And after she was released from jail on a $7,808 bond, Garcia responded, telling the network, ‘I spent the day in po!ice cust-ody, but my question still remains: Are our children safe in our schools, Jeannie Meza-Chavez?’