A Florida mother says she has been bombarded with death threats after a video has emerged on Facebook showing her dunking her toddler son's head into the toilet. But Kaitlyn Wolf, of Leesburg, insists that the now-viral recording does not tell the whole story.‘It was a joke between the three of us,' Wolf told the station WFTV, referring to herself and her two sons. ‘My sons and I horseplay rough. We stuck his head in the toilet and flushed it, and my older son was recording it.' The mom-of-two explained that her three-year-old blurted out a profanity, so she initially decided to punish him by washing out his mouth with soap and water but then she watched a film that included a scene depicting a child's head being shoved into a toilet. Wolf said she grabbed the toddler, held him above the toilet and dipped his head into the water, while her older son filmed it on video. The recording shows the mom holding the crying boy by his arms and dunking his head into the porcelain bowl. Afterwards, Wolf said she sent the video to a friend, bragging in jest about her novel way to discipline her children.
But the friend forwarded the video to the ex-girlfriend of Wolf's boyfriend, who promptly shared it on social media. Most Facebook users who watched the clip failed to find the humour in the toddler's watery punishment and contacted the Leesburg Police Department, urging the agency to intervene. The Leesburg Police Department on Sunday posted a status update on its Facebook page addressing the video.‘The the incident is currently under investigation by the Department of Children and Families, and Detectives are also working with the State Attorney's Office to determine appropriate criminal prosecution. Wolf lamented that since the video has gone viral, she has been getting death threats online, with strangers writing to her that she should be shot and buried alive.
She said the harassment has gone so far that police posted officers outside her house for her protection. According to the mother, who works as a medical assistant, her young son was never in any real danger.‘His the head was never under the water, his face never got wet,' she insisted. 'it’s scary to think I might lose my children over this over a joke that we played.’ She continued: 'It was just a game. I didn't inflict harm on him... he was laughing during the video.’ In an interview, Wolf claimed that what the video does not show is that when she pulled the three-year-old out of the toilet, he said,' Let's do it again.'