A 30-year-old mother dressed up as her daughter and attended nearly a full day of classes in a Texas middle school before anyone in authority caught on to her.
In an attempt to make the point that her daughter's school needed to beef up its security in an age of mass shootings, Casey Garcia dressed in jeans, sneakers, hoodie, and black face mask and recorded herself taking part in classes and other school activities in place of her seventh-grade daughter at Garcia Enriquez Middle School in San Elizario, Texas.
According to Garcia, who captured portions of her day in middle school on video, she said hello to the school's principal, interacted with faculty, ate lunch, and attended gym class with no problems:
https://youtu.be/cKoP9UieGDw
Garcia made it through the school day as far as 7th period before a teacher finally recognized something was up and asked her to stay after class.
In a follow-up video, Garcia explained that she, “Wanted to see if I could make it the entire day without anyone noticing, and I'd say up until seventh period, that’s a very long day for a 30-year-old. I did this to prove a point. I’m a parent. I proved that I could get through the public school system without any problem.
"We need better security at our schools. This is what I tried to prove, and I don't mean to be curt, but I kind of feel like I proved it," Garcia declared. “There have been one too many mass shootings. Are you more concerned that I, a parent, was sitting next to your child, or do we really want to wait for the next person taking their Second Amendment right to the extreme?”:
https://youtu.be/a_5T-qVHgkE
In the video, Garcia maintained that the school's teachers were paying too much attention to the students who were attending online and not enough attention to those students who were physically present, and thus most of them failed to notice that a 30-year-old woman had switched places with her 13-year-old daughter.
"I'm gonna tell you my side of the story: The school was so concerned that [I had] my phone out that they weren't even paying attention to who I was or what I was," Garcia stated.
Waco television station KWTX reported that Garcia was taken into custody by deputies and charged with criminal trespass and tampering with government records:
Deputies met with school administrators, who identified the woman as Garcia.
Detectives conducted an investigation and obtained two criminal warrants for Garcia on charges of criminal trespass and tampering with government records.
Deputies later located Garcia at her residence and took her into custody. Garcia also documented her encounter with authorities on social media.
Garcia was booked into the El Paso County Detention Facility on both charges and for an unrelated traffic warrant. Her bonds totaled $7,908.
Garcia documented her encounter with the deputies who came to her home to arrest her in yet another video:
https://youtu.be/TWYNdu5otYY