George Bermudez apparently didn’t want to let students from Vandegrift High School rush the field after their girls soccer team won a Texas state championship. But the way Bermudez, a police officer assigned to a high school, went about it was captured on video — and now he is on paid administrative leave, the Georgetown Police Department said.
Bermudez, a school resource officer at Georgetown High School, site of the game on Saturday, can be seen tripping one student, trying to trip another and grabbing another. Here it is, as shot by a Vandegrift student:
The incident is being investigated by the Georgetown police internal affairs unit, the Austin American-Statesman reported.
Pam Waggoner, president of the Leander school board in Vandegrift’s home district, was at the game and described the students reacting enthusiastically – it was the school’s first state title in any sport, won on a goal in the last two minutes – but “it wasn’t a chaotic situation,” she told the American-Statesman. “It was over as fast as the kids got on the field.”
Waggoner gave Bermudez the benefit of the doubt, saying that he might have been trying to protect the Vandegrift players from being stuck under a pile of celebrating students.
“I’m sure he was just trying to keep the players safe; it was just his method in which he chose to do it that’s questionable,” Waggoner said.
Watch KXAN’s report:
This story originally appeared on FoxSports.com.