A screengrab from a video of the incident

RICHLAND COUNTY, S.C. — School resource officer Ben Fields, who slammed and dragged a female student in a Spring Valley High School classroom Monday, has been fired after videos of the incident went viral. 

Richland County Sheriff Leon Lott said Wednesday he fired Fields following an internal affairs investigation by the sheriff’s department. 

“The maneuver that he [Fields] used was not based on the training and was not acceptable,” Lott said when announcing the investigation’s findings. “Deputy Ben Fields did wrong this past Monday, and we’re taking action for that.”

Lott said the student should be held accountable for her actions as well. 

“The student was not allowing the teacher to teach and not allowing the students to learn,” Lott said. “This incident started with a big, disruptive student in a class … she started this whole incident with her actions.”

Multiple videos of the incident surfaced on social media. Watch the video from WYFF here.

Police say the incident began around 11 a.m. when the student was texting and disrupting her algebra class. The teacher asked her to leave, and when she refused, an administrator was called in, Lott said.

Fields was then sent to the classroom. Cellphone videos taken by students show him standing before the girl, commanding her to stand up or be removed. She refuses to leave. Fields is then seen flipping the student’s desk to the ground while she’s still in her seat and then dragging her and her desk across the floor.

The investigation concluded that Fields followed procedure until he used physical force. 

“What he should not have done was throw the student,” the sheriff said. “When he threw her across the room, he lost control of her. That’s not acceptable.”

Lott said he had not heard of any issues with Fields before this incident.

“He has tremendous support from the faculty and staff at Spring Valley and the students … it’s never been a complaint,” he said. “If I had cause of concern and thought he was a danger then he wouldn’t have been at the school.”

An FBI investigation into possible criminal charges is ongoing.