Fort Worth mom says school failed family after teacher held 2 kids by throat
The Fort Worth ISD elementary teacher accused of grabbing two children by the throat at school last month held them pinned to the wall by their necks for more than 10 seconds, according to video evidence and Gail Patterson’s arrest warrant affidavit.
Patterson was arrested Sept. 15 and faces two counts of injury to a child, Benbrook police said. She was on leave from Westpark Elementary School, which is located in Benbrook but part of Fort Worth ISD, since the incident and was recently terminated.
The 61-year-old Patterson was listed on the Westpark PTA website as a special-education inclusion teacher in the school’s SPED/RISE program, but her name has since been removed.
Catie, the mother of one of the students, said her 9-year-old daughter called her crying the afternoon of Aug. 20 saying that a teacher had choked her. The fourth-grader was inconsolable, her mother said.
At first Catie, who asked to be identified only by her first name due to privacy concerns, said she was skeptical until she watched the surveillance video of the incident for herself.
“She wasn’t exaggerating,” Catie told reporters at a news conference Wednesday morning. “This is exactly what she described is exactly what happened.”
Catie said she saw her daughter and a little boy in the same class enter the hallway. She understands the two children had gotten in trouble for talking.
“We witnessed Gail Patterson walk into the hall,” Catie said. “Within two seconds, she grabbed the first student by the neck, then grabs my daughter (and) holds them both up against the wall for 11 seconds while she’s in their face.”
There was no audio. Catie said her daughter “was in shock” and doesn’t remember what the teacher was saying to her and the boy.
Patterson’s arrest warrant affidavit states that the teacher “held the children for about 12 seconds before she released her grip and allowed them to re-enter the classroom.”
The incident has affected the whole family, Catie said. Her daughter has been bullied by children who don’t even go to the school, and she’s received threatening messages over the online gaming platform Roblox. The little girl also had trouble swallowing for a couple of days afterward, her mother said.
The two children aren’t in the inclusion program, according to Catie. Patterson was serving as a monitor for around 30 minutes while the main teacher was busy with a fifth-grade class.
To add insult to injury, Catie said, no one from the school notified her about what happened to her daughter. The 9-year-old told three teachers about what Patterson did. Her homeroom teacher finally decided to do something, which Catie said was “the worst mistake.”
The teacher asked Patterson to come back to the room and had her escort the two children, unassisted and unsupervised, to the principal’s office, the mother said.
“During that time, my child and the other student told us that she was saying, ‘This is ridiculous. I can’t believe you’re making such a big deal out of this,’” Catie told reporters Wednesday.
According to the affidavit, Patterson told the homeroom teacher that she didn’t “choke” the children and was “just playing.”
Catie said she feels like the school failed her family. Her daughter was homeschooled previously, and this is her first year at Westpark.
“We trusted them to take care of our child,” Catie said. “And no teacher in that school took care of my child that day all the way up to the principal.”
Varghese Summersett attorney Ty Stimpson is representing the two families. He said legal action against Fort Worth ISD is unlikely due to school districts’ sovereign immunity in Texas, but the families have filed a formal complaint against Patterson.
They are calling on Fort Worth ISD to terminate Patterson’s employment and bar her from working with children, according to Stimpson. They would also like to see teachers receive training on how to better handle this type of situation in the future.
Fort Worth ISD officials confirmed Friday that Patterson is no longer employed by the district and said they have “cooperated fully with law enforcement and child protective services” since the Aug. 20 incident.
Stimpson said they aren’t aware of any previous complaints that have been filed against Patterson.
“We would like to see that there’s actually some jail time, some consequence to this action,” Catie said. “Something that I can take back to my child and say, ‘Look, this is not OK. An adult can never do this to you.’”
Patterson’s defense attorney has not responded to a request for comment.
This story was originally published September 24, 2025 at 10:29 PM.
