Mom runs over 7-year-old son with car after forcing him to walk from school as punishment

An Alabama mother punished her 7-year-old son by making him walk home from school — then ran him over accidentally, according to police.

Sarai Rachel James, 27, picked up her son from school in Boaz around 3:30 p.m. February 9 and learned from the boy’s principal that he had gotten in trouble at school that morning, police said.

Not far from the school, police said, James stopped her car and made her son get out. She told him he would have to walk or run the rest of the way home — about eight blocks, cops said.

James drove beside her son or trailed him for a few blocks, but when she slowed down, the boy tried to grab the door handle of the car, Boaz Chief of Police Michael Abercrombie told McClatchy News.

She accelerated and her son was pulled under the car, which ran over him with a rear tire, according to police.

Abercrombie said investigators believe James accidentally ran over the boy — but he never would have been in that situation if she had not decided to punish him.

“She may not have realized he was doing that,” Abercrombie said.

He was taken to the University of Alabama hospital with only abrasions on his back and the side of the head. 

“God watched over him,” Abercombie said.

James was arrested and charged with aggravated child abuse. She was released on a $50,000 bond three days later, according to jail records.

James is barred from having any contact with her son, Al.com reported.

Another 53-year-old woman who was in the vehicle at the time of the incident was charged with endangering the welfare of a child, a misdemeanor. She was released on a $500 bond.