‘He was begging him to let him in.’ On video, Dallas ISD bus moves toward student in road.
The student, as captured in a video circulating on social media, wanted to get onto a school bus that had already left, so he stood in the middle of the road to try to stop it. He put his hands on the front bumper as he backpedaled slowly.
But the bus didn’t stop.
Yazmin Rojas, of Garland, was in Dallas on her way to work around 8:30 a.m. Tuesday when she noticed the interaction on Spring Valley Road near Preston Road and pulled out her phone to record it. The student, who’s in the Dallas Independent School District, continued to walk backward in front of the bus, which advanced toward him at a slow pace.
A visibly angry bystander then intervened. The man can be seen in the video walking along the vehicle and banging on the driver’s side, shouting, “Stop this bus!” He tells the driver he’s going to report him, and the driver invites him to do so.
Rojas shared the video to Facebook, where it’s been viewed more than 5,000 times, and said the mother of the student reached out to her on Facebook. Her son, Rojas said, was issued a citation for standing in the street.
Robyn Harris, a Dallas ISD spokesperson, said on Friday the driver was placed on administrative leave Thursday morning pending the outcome of an investigation. He was hired by the district in September 2018.
Rojas said she was “shocked” when she saw the incident with the student play out Tuesday.
“He was begging him to let him in,” she said on Friday. “It was unjustified (what) the bus driver was doing.”
The incident elicited angry reactions online from people who didn’t understand why the driver couldn’t stop for the student and felt he was putting the student in danger.
Dallas ISD has operated its own fleet of 1,000 buses since 2017, according to WFAA-TV (Channel 8), a Star-Telegram media partner. Dallas County Schools, WFAA-TV reported, operated the school buses until voters decided to close the district in the wake of a corruption scandal.
The student in the video talked to KXAS-TV (Channel 5), though he remained anonymous. He told the station he knew the driver hadn’t stopped for people in the past and he didn’t want that to happen this time around.
KXAS-TV reported police gave the student a ride to school after issuing him the citation.
This story was originally published December 6, 2019 at 4:03 PM.
