Editor's Note: This article has been updated to clarify the distinction between SolVerus Academy's Mauldin and Greenville campuses. The accompanying photograph showed the separately licensed Greenville campus, rather than the Mauldin campus discussed in this story.
A longtime preschool teacher at SolVerus Academy Christian Preschool in Mauldin was arrested and charged with a felony after she allowed three 4-year-old girls to hit back a boy who had earlier been aggressive toward them. Loretta Denise Freeman was taken into custody on July 19, roughly a month after the June 19 classroom incident, and now faces a charge of unlawful conduct toward a child.
According to The Post and Courier, Freeman is currently out of custody on bond. SolVerus Academy has said it terminated her employment and voluntarily turned over footage of the incident to the South Carolina Department of Social Services after the matter was reported. The preschool, according to its own website, has campuses in both Greenville and Mauldin, and the company has said it has operated in the Greenville area for 25 years.
The two campuses have separate DSS licenses and different listed operators. DSS lists the Mauldin campus at 739 N. Main Street under license No. 23744, with Kerri Motes as operator, and the Greenville campus at 4317 East North Street under license No. 17599, with Alexis Finley Pridmore as operator. The incident and discipline citations described here concern the Mauldin campus. In its correction request, the Greenville campus said the locations operate under separate leadership and that it is not a party to the lawsuit or the subject of the regulatory matter described.
Unlawful conduct toward a child is classified as a felony under South Carolina law, and it can carry a sentence of up to 10 years in prison along with a discretionary fine. The station's report notes that Freeman had roughly 30 years of experience working in childcare, had passed background checks through the State Law Enforcement Division, the FBI and DSS, and had signed SolVerus's discipline policy annually while completing 15 hours of training each year.
DSS Inspection Found Discipline Practices Noncompliant
The South Carolina Department of Social Services inspected the Mauldin facility on June 30 and found it compliant in 53 separate inspection areas, but noncompliant in the category covering positive, non-abusive discipline practices. A DSS agent reviewed discipline regulations with SolVerus staff during that same visit, and the same account notes the agency had reviewed the facility's discipline regulations on two prior occasions. Records reviewed for the SolVerus campus in Mauldin, listed with the South Carolina Division of Early Care and Education, state that discipline regulations and policies were reviewed with the director, co-director and owner/operator, and that positive, nonviolent methods of guidance for children were addressed through training.
The paper's reporting also states that the Mauldin campus was cited for high-severity discipline and behavior-management issues in both August 2024 and December 2024. The separately licensed Greenville campus has no deficiencies listed in its publicly available DSS inspection history, which displays deficiencies for 36 months. A DSS spokesperson identified as Connelly-Anne Ragley said officials could not immediately respond to questions about how the Freeman case was handled.
A spokesperson for SolVerus told the outlet that Freeman's actions amounted to a very poor decision on her part.
Boy's Aunt Sues Over Alleged Trauma
The boy's aunt, Sonya Aubrey, filed a lawsuit against Freeman and SolVerus in Greenville County court on Sept. 9. Aubrey took over custody of her nephew after his mother died in 2025, and the lawsuit attributes behavioral and emotional symptoms he has since exhibited, including urinating on himself, to the alleged abuse and emotional trauma from the incident.
The suit alleges that SolVerus was negligent in hiring and supervising Freeman, and that both Freeman and the preschool are liable for battery and intentional infliction of emotional distress. Aubrey is seeking unspecified damages to cover the boy's humiliation as well as past and future medical and psychological treatment expenses. The complaint's full text and its eventual outcome have not been made public.
A Statewide Pattern in Discipline Citations
South Carolina has nearly 2,300 licensed child-care providers statewide, and the news organization's analysis identified 23 of them with at least three discipline citations over the prior three years. The outlet said it used artificial intelligence to help scrape and organize the publicly available state records behind that count. The state's own child-care database notes that facility deficiencies remain listed online for 36 months, giving parents a rolling three-year window into a provider's compliance history.
