MUNCY – Felony and misdemeanor charges have been filed against a former assistant teacher at Fun Academy Daycare at 145 Ashler Manor Drive who “mishandled” a 1-year-old toddler “and dropped him, causing him to strike his head,” Muncy Township Police Cpl. James Taylor said in an affidavit.

Tina Marie Mosteller, 43, of 2891 Quaker Hill Road, Cogan Station, has been charged with two counts of felony endangering the welfare of a child and one count of simple assault, according to court records filed at the office of District Judge Jon E. Kemp.

In the same complaint, Taylor alleged that Mosteller “delayed in notifying an appropriate supervisor or daycare nurse about the injury for six hours.”

The child was injured on May 7, and was treated at Evangelical Community Hospital, Lewisburg, for a concussion, Taylor said.

The child’s mother had dropped off the toddler at the daycare center in the morning, and received notification in the afternoon that her son “bumped his head on a wooden stool. When she picked him up at 4:30 p.m., she was told that he had vomited recently, and had a bruise and a small raised bump to the left side of his forehead,” Taylor said in an affidavit. The staff recommended to the mother that she take her son to the hospital.

The next day, the mother received a phone call from a Fun Academy supervisor, Raelyn Homet, who “had reviewed the classroom video surveillance of the incident in which the child was injured. Homet told the mother that an assistant teacher caring for her son mishandled him and dropped him, causing him to strike his head,” Taylor said. The mother then notified police, beginning a criminal investigation.

Homet told police that “their staff are trained to pick up children using two hands, but that Mosteller picked up the child with one hand and dropped him,” Taylor said in the affidavit.

In the video, Taylor said, the child is seen “hiding under a wooden table. Mosteller bends down, reaches under the table, grabs the toddler by the right arm and swings him counterclockwise around her body. She then lets go of the arm and he falls forward, striking his head on the edge of the wooden step stool.”

Mosteller then grabs the child’s head with both her hands and pulls his head backwards and then looks at their forehead, Taylor said. “She does not apply ice or contact the daycare nurse,” he said.

In the same video, Taylor said, Mosteller is seen lifting two other children in her care by one arm. In one incident, the assistant teacher grabs a child’s “right arm and abruptly turns around and and pulls him behind her. The juvenile’s knees give way and the accused swings him in front of her. As she does so, his head comes within a few inches of striking the edge of a table,” Taylor said.

The county’s Children and Youth Department also got involved and assisted Taylor with his investigation.

In a termination letter she received from the daycare center, Mosteller was told that the manner in which she allegedly “handled several children that day was in direct violation of the Department of Human Services regulations,” Taylor said, adding that the letter went on to report that Mosteller “failed to follow safety and reporting protocols.”

Following her arraignment Friday before Kemp, Mosteller was released on $35,000 bail.