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The DNAinfo archives brought to you by WNYC.
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Police Arrest Chaperone Who Hit Teen at Park Slope Middle School

 Roberta Woelfling was volunteering at an M.S. 51 choral concert when she made a hand gesture and unintentionally struck a 13-year-old student with her fingers, she said. Police are investigating the incident as an assault.
Roberta Woelfling was volunteering at an M.S. 51 choral concert when she made a hand gesture and unintentionally struck a 13-year-old student with her fingers, she said. Police are investigating the incident as an assault.
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PARK SLOPE — The volunteer chaperone who allegedly hit another woman's 13-year-old daughter during a concert at M.S. 51 has been arrested, police said.

Roberta Woelfling was charged with misdemeanor assault, an NYPD spokesman said.

“I was gesturing with my hand and [it was] misconstrued,” Woelfling told DNAinfo New York on Thursday.

“I guess you have to be very careful around other people’s children.”

Woelfling said police came to her door Wednesday night then drove her to the 78th Precinct, where she was issued a desk appearance ticket. She's due in court on July 6, she said.

The maximum sentence for misdemeanor assault is up to one year in jail, a spokeswoman for the Brooklyn District Attorney's office said.

The charge stems from an incident on the evening of May 15 when Woelfling was chaperoning M.S. 51 students backstage during a school concert.

Woelfling approached a group of teens to tell them to quiet down, and made a hand gesture directed at a girl who was chewing gum, she said.

Woelfling said her fingers inadvertently brushed the girl's face, but the teen says Woelfling "punched" her. The girl reported the incident immediately to school administrators, who had the girl write a statement about what happened.

Woelfling, however, was allowed to leave the building and the girl's mom didn't find out about the alleged assault until the end of the concert when her daughter told her. The school didn't call the authorities about the incident, leaving the teen's mother outraged.

The girl was described as "visibly shaken" after the incident, according to a school administrator's handwritten report obtained by DNAinfo New York. The school administrator also wrote that Woelfling said she "struck" the student.

"I told [Woelfling] it was wrong," the school staffer wrote in the report.

The girl was left with swelling and an abrasion near her mouth, according to her mother, Petal Joseph.

Joseph said Thursday that she was satisfied with the police response.

"“I’m glad,” Joseph said. “I just want her to pay for what she did."