The incident is the most recent involving Rochester law enforcement officers, which has sparked widespread criticism and condemnation.
The body camera footage of the February 22 incident shows a police officer responding to a shoplifting complaint in a store, confronting a woman who is seen holding the child.
The woman proceeds to show the policeman the inside of her purse, insisting that she did not steal anything.
The video shows the policeman asking the woman to wait with him, but she runs away with the child in her arms. The policeman then chases her down the street, approaches her in a parking lot and restricts her.
The child can be seen wandering and crying in the middle of the fight until another police officer arrives at the scene and pulls the child away.
In a statement, the Rochester Police Department said the officers were responding to a complaint from a woman who robbed a store who was “arguing with store employees and refusing to leave”.
The woman who received pepper spray matches the suspect’s description in the complaint, police said.
“The child did not receive pepper spray or was injured during the arrest,” the statement continues. “The woman was accused of trespassing and was fined for appearing.”
The police officer in question was placed in administrative duties until an internal investigation is completed, the police said.
The Rochester Police Department did not respond to CNN’s request for comment.
Multiple incidents
Rochester Police Chief Cynthia Herriot-Sullivan said during a news conference on Friday that it appears that officers were following the department’s pepper spray policy, which is allowed if the individual is “physically resisting”.
But questions are being raised about the need to use such force.
Rochester police officers handcuffed him and covered his head with a “spitting sock” after he spit on the police, according to footage from the body camera.
‘A different strategy’
The Police Accountability Board, which gave a press conference on Friday to address the incident, said the department needs to “fundamentally change its organizational culture”.
The council said there were “worrying parallels” between the February 22 incident and the 9-year-old boy’s pepper spray in January.
“Both incidents involved black mothers. Both involved black children. Both involved blacks obviously in crisis. Both involved police officers using pepper spray on or around a black child,” the council statement said.
Rochester Police Union did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Rochester Police Deputy Chief Executive Andre Anderson said at a news conference on Friday that the department is working on “policy changes”, which include training courses on deceleration and race relations.
“We need to understand how to respond to young people and where they come from,” he said.
“When such incidents occur, I am relieved to have ensured that body cameras are used by our police, so that we can see what is happening on our streets and hold police officers accountable,” said Rochester Mayor Lovely Warren in a statement.
“The change will not come until we have the ability to hold our officers fully accountable when they violate public confidence,” she said.
CNN’s Saffeya Ahmed, Laura James, Kay Jones, Alec Snyder and Kristina Sgueglia contributed to this report.