Unfortunately, the classroom can be a dangerous place nowadays, but not just for the students. The teachers are also at risk.

In New York, a gym teacher is filing a lawsuit against the city after, he claims, a 6-year-old student physically assaulted him.

At 5-foot-10 and 220 pounds, gym teacher John Webster is not a slight figure. But the former college football player claims a 50-pound, 6-year-old student physically assaulted him and sent him into therapy.

The New York Post reports that Webster fractured his ankle and injured his knee, all at the hands of 4-foot-2 Rodrigo Carpio. Walker says he now has to wear a brace on his right leg.

"It's sort of like an angel-devil sort of thing," Webster, 27, said of Rodrigo. The boy "looks like an angel, but then, all of a sudden, that halo turns into horns. It's been a nightmare. It's embarrassing. It's humiliating."

And there's reportedly more than just the incident with Webster. Rodrigo, a first-grader at PS 330 in Queens, also allegedly kicked the school principal and pinched several other individuals, including a school security officer.

Now I don’t know how much I buy into a 6-year-old beating the snot out of a 5-foot-10, 220-pound gym teacher, but it does bring up a real concern for teachers' safety in the classroom. You have kids nowadays who will not hesitate to strike a teacher, and the teachers can't fight back without being accused of child abuse. And what do the parents of these "tiny terrors" do? You guessed it: swear up and down their kid can do no wrong and let him get away with murder.

But Rodrigo’s dad, Jorge Carpio, 44, scoffed: “The lawsuit is totally absurd. How could my little boy do so much damage? My poor son.”

The boy’s mom added, “This is a terrible thing to say [about] a child.”

“To every mother, their child is an angel,” said Josefa Marcia da Silva, 33, of her son, now 4-foot-3 and 64 pounds. “I know that he has problems, but he doesn’t deserve to be called such names.”

Should teachers be allowed to defend themselves if a student assaults them? Absolutely. But the real problem, as usual, lies with the good-for-nothing parents who don't bother disciplining their children.

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