People are outraged after footage was posted online of a school resource officer assaulting a student in Columbia, South Carolina.

USA Today reports Richland County Sheriff Leon Lott has called in the FBI and the U.S. Justice Department to conduct a federal investigation into the incident that took place on Monday at Spring Valley High School.

Several students recorded video of the incident from various angles.

In the footage, Sheriff's Deputy Ben Fields asked the student to get up from her chair. When she doesn't follow his instruction, the officer yanks the girl backward by her neck, turning over the desk. He then drags the student across the floor before demanding her to put her hands behind her back.

Lt. Curtis Wilson, spokesman for the Richland County Sheriff Department, said Fields was called in after the instructor asked the student "to leave the class several times."

Student Tony Robinson Jr., who captured footage of the event, commented on the event during an interview with WLTX 19.

"I've never seen anything so nasty looking, so sick to the point that you know, other students are turning away, don't know what to do, and are just scared for their lives," Robinson said. "That's supposed to be somebody that's going to protect us. Not somebody that we need to be scared of, or afraid."

The student was charged with disrupting school. A fellow classmate, 18-year-old Niya Kenny, was also charged after she got up to defend the girl.

"I had never seen nothing like that in my life, a man use that much force on a little girl. A big man, like 300 pounds of full muscle. I was like 'no way, no way.' You can't do nothing like that to a little girl. I'm talking about she's like 5'6"," Kenny said.

James Manning, head of the Richland School District Two board, said the video was "extremely disturbing."

"I can assure you that we are taking this matter very seriously," he said in a statement, via CNN. "The district superintendent has been in constant contact with the Richland County Sheriff to express our concern over this matter, and the district has banned the deputy in question from all District Two property."

Fields has been accused of excessive force in the past. He has faced two lawsuits for battery but had both cases dismissed.

Watch video of the incident below.