PINE TOWNSHIP | Legal action is being taken alleging a Pine Elementary School teacher roughed up a 6-year-old boy now afraid to return to her classroom.

"He's traumatized and he doesn't want to go back to school," said Doug Bernacchi, a Michigan City-based attorney representing the boy's mother, Tabitha Cooley.

According to a tort claim filed with Michigan City Area Schools, the woman is seeking $20,000 and a transfer of her son and her other children who attend Pine Elementary to Coolspring Elementary School.

Bernacchi, though, said keeping the boy at Pine Elementary but with another teacher along with counseling to ease his fears about returning might be sufficient enough for his client to strike an accord.

He said the money sought is more an "attention getter" in hope of getting district officials to the bargaining table to return the child to the classroom.

"It's not so much a legal issue. It's more about the kid's future and what's the right thing to do," said Bernacchi.

So far, Bernacchi said his client has kept the boy home after school officials rejected switching classrooms.

In her legal filing, Cooley alleges the teacher grabbed him by the arm, leaving a bruise because the boy would not go to music class in late January.

She has kept her son out of school ever since because he simply doesn't want to go back to the same teacher, said Bernacchi.

Bernacchi said he has recommended to his client that she return him to school while the case is pending to avoid legal troubles.

He said she tried Tuesday but caved in to her son's resistance.

"It's much akin to being hit by a baseball on the baseball diamond in Little League and now the child doesn't want to go back on the baseball field," said Bernacchi.

MCAS spokesperson Betsy Kohn said the school corporation would not comment on the case because it's a personnel matter.