Inset: Jordyn H. Whitlaw (Columbia County Jail). Background: Evans Towne Center Park (WRDW).
A 34-year-old Georgia mother was arrested over the weekend after allegedly physically abusing her 5-year-old daughter at a crowded festival, claiming she could do whatever she wanted because the victim was her child.
Jordyn Kahanamoku Whitlaw was charged with one count of second-degree cruelty to children, records show.
According to an incident report obtained by Law&Crime, deputies with the Columbia County Sheriff”s Office were working at a Mardi Gras festival event at the Evans Towne Center Park when they were approached by a witness who told them “a woman was abusing a juvenile girl at the playground area.”
The witness said she had been sitting at a playground-area picnic table when she heard a woman say, “Get down.” When she looked up, the witness reportedly saw Whitlaw “throw [the victim] into the chain-link fence and get in her face.”
“She could hear Whitlaw yelling at [the victim], but could not tell what was said,” the report states. “[The victim] began to cry, then Whitlaw grabbed [the victim] by her ears and continued to scream at her. Whitlaw then grabbed [the victim] by her neck and began slamming [her] head into the fence.”
When the woman yelled for Whitlaw to stop harming the child, Whitlaw allegedly “responded by saying she could do what she wanted because it was her daughter.” The witness then ran to get the deputies.
Another witness said she saw Whitlaw push the child “into the fence for a timeout.” She said that when the child ran away, Whitlaw caught up to the 5-year-old and “grabbed her by her hair and carried her back to the fence” and “threw [the victim] into the fence again.”
After turning away from the scene briefly, the witness said she looked back and saw that Whitlaw “had her hands around [the victim’s] neck.”
“She saw that [the victim] was crying,” the report says. “Another woman then ran toward Whitlaw and [the victim] to defuse the situation. Whitlaw said to the woman, ‘That’s my daughter, I can do what I want.'”
A third witness said the ordeal began with the child “not listening” to Whitlaw. The third witness confirmed Whitlaw threw the child into the fence and “grabbed her by the throat,” emphasizing that Whitlaw, not the child, was the primary aggressor.
Deputies said the 5-year-old had a visible red abrasion on the right side of her neck. Whitlaw was taken into custody at the scene after the victim’s father arrived to take custody of the child. A report was also filed with the state Department of Family and Child Services.
It was not immediately clear when Whitlaw was scheduled to appear in court.
