The owner of a behavioral therapy center in North Richland Hills was arrested Wednesday, two days after the parents of a non-speaking autistic child filed a lawsuit alleging that an employee at the center assaulted their son.
Kiara Henry, 34, was taken into custody at the North Richland Hills Police Department and is charged with failure to report child abuse, which is a state felony, police said. Ashley Moreno, 31, the center employee accused of attacking the child, remains under an active assault warrant, police said.
According to the lawsuit, the assault occurred at ABA Interactive, an applied behavior analysis center in North Richland Hills. The lawsuit alleges that the father of a 7-year-old child noticed his son had a mark on his face when he came to the center to pick him up on June 20.
ABA staff told the family he inflicted the injury on himself but refused to show the boy’s family a video of the incident, the lawsuit says. Eventually, the parents received a copy of the video from a center employee, which shows an ABA staff member grabbing the boy by the collar, shoving him into a corner and slamming him against the wall with her hands around his neck, the lawsuit says.
The lawsuit also alleged that the employee committed two other incidents of violence against children at the center that were not reported to authorities and falsely disclosed to parents.
Wesley Gould, a lawyer representing the family, said the incident was shocking. He said he was very disturbed that the employee who allegedly committed the assault was not fired.
“It’s hard to believe that there are people out here who have no problem doing this to a child,” Gould said.
A voicemail left with ABA Interactive was not answered Wednesday evening.
Police have also asked for the public’s help in locating Moreno and are offering a $1,000 reward through Crime Stoppers of Tarrant County. Anyone with information on her whereabouts is asked to call 817-469-8477, the department said in a news release.
Henry was booked into the Tarrant County Jail Wednesday evening. Information about her bail was not immediately available and it was not immediately clear if she had an attorney.
