Baltimore mother who slapped son for rioting: 'I didn't want him to be a Freddie Gray'

A woman captured on video slapping her teenage son for taking part in the Baltimore riots has won praise from the city’s police commissioner and was heralded on social media as “Mum of the Year”.

She was videotaped by Baltimore television WMAR on Monday chasing a teenager, clad in a hoodie with his face covered, beating him and demanding he “take that f­­­***ing mask off" - a reprimand that went viral online on Tuesday.

They were identified by CBS News as Toya Graham and her 16-year-old son Michael.

Graham said in an interview that she pulled her son away from the crowd because “at the end of the day, I don’t want him to be a Freddie Gray,” according to CBS News.

“I’m a no-tolerant mother. Everybody that knows me, know I don’t play that,” Toya Graham, a single mother of six, said. “He said, when ‘I seen you,’ he said, ‘ma, my instinct was to run.’”

The riots began hours after the funeral for Freddie Gray, who died following injuries he suffered in police custody.
Baltimore’s violent unrest erupted after the funeral on Monday of Gray, a 25-year-old black man who died in police custody.
The Baltimore station that originally videotaped Graham said she saw her son throwing rocks while watching coverage of the mayhem and ran out to stop him.