The Fresno Police Department has completed its investigation into an altercation involving Fresno Unified trustee Terry Slatic and a student that took place last week and was captured on video.
The report, which was being forwarded to the Fresno County District Attorney’s office, does not make a recommendation about potential charges. Police detectives spoke with witnesses, and reviewed video, which they say is “unclear.”
“It was written as a general incident (report), possible Penal Code 242, which is a battery. We are just outlining conflicting information,” Deputy Police Chief Michael Reid said. He did not specify which individual they were investigating for battery.
According to Deputy DA Steve Wright, his department had not received the report as of Thursday afternoon.
District spokeswoman Amy Igsvood said the district first made contact with the student Monday morning after attempts to reach him the prior two days.

Slatic Says Safety Will Prevail

Slatic, in new comments to GV Wire, said he is awaiting how a district investigation plays out. That probe is independent of the police department inquiry.
“When everything comes out from this, Fresno Unified will be a safer place,” Slatic said.

Superintendent Says Video Speaks for Itself

Fresno Unified Superintendent Bob Nelson, speaking to GV Wire education reporter Myles Barker on Wednesday evening, said the district released the video as a matter of public interest.
“I am not going to comment on Trustee Slatic’s actions. I think, honestly, I think the video speaks for itself. … I think people are going to formulate whatever opinion they are going to form based on that,” Nelson said. “If it were my child, that wouldn’t be something I would condone necessarily, but I think we need to let the investigation run its course before we presume any additional information regarding what’s going on with that circumstance.”
The district said the student remains in school, as nothing he did has merited discipline. The district is not revealing his identity, citing privacy concerns.

 
“One of the things we did is, we did the threat assessment, and it was not perceived that this person was a threat at the time of the circumstance,” Nelson said. “The investigation is ongoing … but at current we have not had anything surface that rises to the level of discipline of the student. The (school) site would make that decision, generally speaking.”

Johnson Criticizes Slatic

Nasreen Johnson, who lost to Slatic in the November election, said her phone has been blowing up.
“We’re having money, time and attention not being spent where it needs to be — which is schools. Let’s not elect hotheads or bullies to our elected positions,” Johnson said of what the community has been telling her.
Johnson did not like what she saw in the security camera video.
“One of the things that was really important to me is that we make sure we have adults being good role models for kids. When we have adults, from what I could see in the video yanking on backpacks and creating a verbal altercation into a physical altercation, that is concerning for me,” Johnson said.
When asked about Slatic’s assertion that the student made threats to shoot him, Johnson responded, “I saw the kid’s hands in plain view. So, I’m not sure … once the kid ran off, it didn’t appear that Slatic followed him. … I just didn’t understand how if they thought there was a weapon in the backpack, why those actions were taken in that order.”
Slatic won the November election in a four-person race with 34% of the vote. Johnson finished second with 29%. She is now running for a vacant Fresno County supervisor’s seat, with a March 5 election date.

Watch: Johnson Talks About Incident