KANSAS CITY, Mo. – Tomesha Primm contends her son was traumatized in the second grade when a school resource officer handcuffed the boy because he allegedly wouldn’t stop crying.

Primm is now suing Kansas City Public Schools, George Melcher Elementary School Principal Anne Wallace, and officer Brandon Craddock over the April 2014 incident that allegedly left the child with bed-wetting nightmares, The Huffington Post reports.

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The lawsuit contends Kalyb Primm Wiley – then 7 years old, 50 pounds and less than 4 feet tall – was disturbing his second-grade class at Melcher by crying and screaming over a bullying incident, a situation made worse by the child hearing problems.

Craddock heard the boy’s cries from the hallway and intervened, and the lawsuit contends Wiley quieted down after the officer twice asked the child to accompany him to the principal’s office. The lawsuit alleges Craddock then took Wiley into the hallway, where the child began to cry again and attempted to walk away, the Kansas City Star reports.

“Instead of stopping or employing any de-escalation techniques, Defendant Craddock twisted (Kalyb’s) arms and handcuffed … his arms behind his back, and then led him to the front office in handcuffs,” according to the lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Kansas City.

The family is represented by the American Civil Liberties Union of Missouri.

“Setting aside that he was 7-years-old and 50 pounds and no danger to anyone, it is illegal for the government to handcuff and restrain anyone without probable cause that a crime has been committed,” ACLU attorney Tony Rothert told the Star.

“This is going back to what has worked for years and that is treating disciplinary issues in schools as if they are disciplinary issues,” Rothert said. “Instead of treating a routine situation involving a child acting like a child like it’s a crime.”

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Craddock alleged in his report on the incident that Wiley was “out of control in his classroom and refused to follow my directions,” according to the Post.

The child sat in the front office with his hands cuffed behind his back until his father arrived. Primm said Wiley began to have nightmares and wet the bed after the ordeal, and the trauma forced her to remove him from school for two years.

Primm said at a press conference this week that she was “shocked, in disbelief and still angry about the incident,” and was never given an adequate explanation from school officials about why the restrains were necessary to begin with. She homeschooled the boy until this year, when the now 10-year-old returned to a different public school.

“That someone of that authority didn’t have any compassion or try to figure out what the problem was before they did what they did … I don’t understand how that was the first resort,” she said, adding that her son has never been violent in school.

“It was unfortunate that he had to scream and holler but at the same time I don’t feel like a resource security officer should be in authority to deal with a child that needs to be disciplined,” Primm said. “I feel like it would be more for the teacher to intervene and say, ‘Time out.’ ”

State education policy calls for restraints on students only in “emergency or crisis situations” and the ACLU contends Craddock was out of line, though district officials issued a statement that argues otherwise.

“Contrary to reports that KCPS security officers violated certain [Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education] regulations, all KCPS officers are commissioned by the Kansas City Police Department in accordance with state law. This important distinction alters the parameters of their capacity to act in certain situations,” the statement read.

“Notwithstanding the expanded scope of their authority, the school system’s present administration is taking numerous steps to ensure that our security officers are focused on de-escalation, conflict resolution, trauma intervention and relationship building.”

Wiley’s family is suing for damages and attorney’s fees, and is also asking the court to order Kansas City Public Schools to train officers on students’ constitutional rights.

“Justo don’t handcuff children,” Wiley told the Star. “That’s it.”