Toya Graham: Baltimore teenager slapped by his 'hero' mum admits he was wrong

Freddie Gray died of spinal injuries while in police custody earlier this month

A woman reprimands a young man believed to be her son for allegedly attempting to take part in the riots (WMAR)

When a teenage boy from Baltimore donned a mask and headed out to join the riots erupting in the US city, little did he know that millions of people would see his mother slapping him around the face and marching him home, in an expletive-ridden video.

The footage view over 6 million times shows mother Toya Graham slapping and shouting at her 16-year-old son Michael Singleton in the middle of the street, after she saw her son with a brick in his hand.

Graham was quickly hailed as "mother of the year" on Twitter, for trying to prevent her son from joining the riots which were sparked by the death of Freddie Gray, 25, the young black man who died of spinal injuries while in police custody.

But despite the pained look on Singleton’s face in the video, the teenager has admitted that his mother was simply trying to protect him from dying like Gray.

“She didn’t want me to get in trouble (with the) law. She didn’t want me to be like another Freddie Gray,” Singleton told CNN.

The teenager said that he when spotted his mother he realised he was in trouble, as the night before he had sworn not to join in the violence.

“It was just World War III from right there,” Singleton said of the moment his mother found him.

Graham told the broadcaster that she wasn’t concerned about embarrassing her son in front of the crowd, as he was “embarrassing himself by wearing that mask and that hoodie and doing what he was doing.”

“I did (get emotional). You know, once he threw that rock down I said, 'You weren't brought up like this,“ Graham said.

Michael Singleton has acknowledged his mother was simply trying to remove him from a dangerous situation (CNN)

The family’s account comes as protests against Gray’s death in Baltimore have sparked similar rallies in the cities of New York and Boston.

Protesters in New York gathered in Manhattan’s Union Square, where they chanted ”no justice, no peace“ and ”hands up, don't shoot,“ a reference to the police killing of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, last year.

At least 60 people were detained by police in New York on Wednesday night, after police using a loudspeaker warned the crowd they would be taken into custody if they marched in the street.

Meanwhile in Boston, activists gathered in a park behind police headquarters in Roxbury and continued with a peaceful march to a park at Dudley Square, across from the Roxbury neighborhood police station.

Additional reporting by AP