A 41-year-old teacher made headlines after she allegedly confined her COVID-positive son to her car trunk all in the hopes of not contracting the virus herself. The Texas native was quickly made to regret it.
Sarah Beam, a Texas teacher, decided to stuff her 13-year-old son in her trunk, due to his COVID positive status. After packing up her son, the 41-year-old mother drove to a drive-thru coronavirus testing site in Houston, according to KPRC, and that’s when things went sideways in her grand scheme.
Witnesses reported hearing noises coming from the back of Beam’s vehicle when she pulled up to the tented testing center at Ken Pridgeon Stadium, according to court documents. Bevin Gordon, the health services director at the site, asked Beam to open the trunk — revealing the teenager lying down inside. The mother was then told that the child would not get a test until he was removed from the trunk and placed in the back seat of the car.
The health site director called law enforcement and told police “the defendant confirmed that her son, K.H., who is a 13-year-old child, was in the trunk of the car due (to) the child having been tested positive for Covid.” According to the warrant issued, the mother told the health director that she wanted to prevent exposure to the virus while driving her son to the testing site for “additional testing.”
During the investigation, police were able to review surveillance cameras at an adjacent middle school and corroborate that the child “exited the trunk of the car and entered into the back seat of the vehicle on the passenger side,” the warrant said, according to CNN.
After the local media got ahold of the story, the backlash against Beam was underway. Local residents had no sympathy for Beam and had harsh words for her.
- “I don’t sympathize with that at all,” said Claud Green, a father. “I would have all my children right in front of my car. If I got it, I got it. If I didn’t, I didn’t. My kids come first.”
- “That’s sick,” Scott Weaver, another local resident, weighed in. “That’s terrible. You don’t put anybody in a trunk. She’s a teacher? I’d rip her license from her in five minutes,” Weaver added. “That’s not caring for children.”
A local Houston KRPC anchor showed up at Beam’s residence at the same time as the police, who were there to serve a warrant for her arrest. The teacher was not at home, and some speculated she went into hiding or was attempting to evade being arrested right away. “Yeah, we put a call into the constable’s office to try and find out why they left Sarah Beam’s house in Jersey City without taking anyone into custody,” the ABC 13 anchor said. “But they would not answer our questions.”
Sarah Beam was arrested 24 hours later and posted bond. However, it appears she has a colorful past. “Beam is the daughter of white supremacist Louis Ray Beam Jr., who was once a fugitive on the FBI’s Top 10 list, according to a law enforcement bulletin from 1987,” Heavy reported.
According to the Associated Press, Beam’s father “had been grand dragon of the United Klans of America until the 1970s when he was banished for mishandling funds. He then formed his own ragtag Klan band.” As a child, the school teacher was “on the run” from law enforcement authorities with her racist father. “Beam may also be accompanied by his 7-year-old daughter from a previous marriage, Sarah Hadassah Beam,” AP reported in a 1987 article.
“Beam and others involved in the conspiracy have been accused of more than 100 criminal acts designed to foment revolt, including the attempted assassinations of a federal judge and an FBI agent, the destruction of public utilities, pollution of water supplies, and establishing illegal guerrilla training camps,” AP reported in 1987.
Sarah Beam, as a teacher, had her own philosophy. “Newly-revealed video footage depicts Beam virtue signaling about how the classroom ‘should be an extension of my home,’” Post Millinneal reported. “The original video featuring the educator was part of a playlist by the school district, featuring their best and brightest teachers.”