A police officer from the 52nd Precinct maced a 17-year-old Walton High School student on school grounds on Dec. 17 in an incident that advocates believe is the latest consequence of the Kingsbridge school’s rampant overcrowding.

The incident, involving an African-American boy whose name was not disclosed by the police, took place around noon. The student was treated at Montefiore Medical Center. There was no update on his condition.

Whether or not the incident should have required the use of Mace, a pepper or tear gas spray that causes intense burning in the eyes, depends on whom you speak to. The New York Police Department says the officer and a school safety agent observed the student wandering through the school’s halls. When they approached him, the student punched the agent, police said. The officer maced the student after he resisted arrest. He was charged with disorderly conduct, obstructing governmental administration, and resisting arrest.

The Department of Education corroborates that account, and said that the student’s suspension is pending.

But students who witnessed the incident claim their peer was a victim of overly aggressive policing. “They kept trying to get him to take off his fitting,” said Vanessa Cage, a Walton student, about the stocking caps that many teens wear. When the student refused to remove it, Cage said she saw the officers tackle him and spray him in the eye.

Chanel Graves, 17, who also says she saw the altercation, thinks the police target students with hats. “Every day they are snatching off people’s hats,” said Graves, a Walton student from University Avenue.

Students of Walton and the three smaller high schools housed on its third floor were visibly agitated on Friday afternoon during a press conference organized by Sistas and Brothas United, a local youth alliance working with Walton students. “If they could do it to him [use Mace], they could do it to me, too,” said Javonne Hurd, 15, a Walton student from Soundview.

Hurd says that officers, now more prevalent at Walton and other city schools that have ongoing safety problems, often spray Mace into crowds of students to control fights. “They sprayed my brother’s friend and he had to go to hospital,” said Hurd, whose older brother also attends Walton.

Neither DOE nor the police would comment if Mace was typically used at Walton or other high schools.

But many advocates and students believe hostile incidents like the one two weeks ago, stems directly from Walton’s intense overcrowding. “We have a crisis here,” said Adaline Walker-Higgins, parent of a student at Celia Cruz High School of Music. Walker-Higgins and many other Cruz parents were angered when the school moved last year from DeWitt Clinton High School to the already cramped Walton.

“They promised small schools and they are not here,” said Walker-Higgins, who called for a day of mourning over the overcrowding situation.

Sistas and Brothas met with students last Tuesday to strategize about how to improve Walton’s safety situation, including creating more exits and reducing the overcrowding.  Representatives from the NAACP Legal Defense Fund were also present to discuss possible legal ramifications of the incident.