Father Beats Alleged Bully For Picking On Autistic Son: Justice?

This “father beats bully” story is enough to leave you parents out there feeling an uncomfortable set of emotions.

On the one hand, 44-year-old Burnis Hurd loves his son, a 9-year-old autistic boy who was being picked on by an older kid on his bus. That’s what led him to board the bus with his son and then have the child point out the alleged bully to him.

However, Hurd goes pretty overboard in what he does next.

Instead of issuing a stern warning to the 11-year-old about bullying people and leaving things with a simple threat, he did what no adult should ever do.

He “grabbed the 11-year old by the hair, pulled hard and raised the child out of his seat, then shoved him on the side of the bus where the window meets the wall,” said Richmond Police Lt. Mark Gagan in comments to CBS San Francisco.

Hurd also warned the 11-year-old and “some other kids on the bus” that he would kill them if they ever bullied his son again.

(It’s worth mentioning here that the 11-year-old and the autistic boy are both enrolled in Wilson Elementary School’s special education program.)

Surprisingly, the attack was not turned in by the bus driver, who refused to get involved. It wasn’t until the 11-year-old arrived at school and told his principal, then showed him his injuries, that an arrest was made.

(The child ended up with a cheek abrasion and a gashed earlobe.)

Burnis Hurd is now in jail and faces charges of child abuse and bodily injury to a child. He is being held pending a $50,000 bond.

For any parent who’s ever held their newborn child close and comforted those first cries, Hurd’s reaction is almost understandable in a way that childless people don’t really grasp until they feel it themselves.

You would do anything to protect your little ones from the outside world, and sometimes that might even mean resorting to some scary, irrational, lunatic behavior.

Something similar to this happened in September 2010 when James Willie Jones stormed on to his daughter’s bus and confronted her bullies.

In that case, the story drew national attention and led many parents to donate to Jones’ legal defense fund.

However, the circumstances here were between a 9-year-old and an 11-year-old. You have to wonder whether a 44-year-old man whose first reaction is to attack an 11-year-old is stable enough to be a parent.

(Plus, these impulsive reactions usually turn out bad.)

What do you think about this father beats bully story, readers? Should the father face jail time, and could you see yourself doing something like this if someone bullied your child?

[Image via Richmond Police]