Authorities in the US state of South Carolina have fired a white police officer who violently dragged a female black student out of her classroom.

The incident, recorded on the mobile phones of students, occurred at Spring Valley High School in Columbia, South Carolina on Monday.

On Wednesday, Richland County Sheriff Leon Lott denounced the action of senior deputy Ben Fields as “unacceptable and in violation of proper procedures.”

"What he should not have done is throw the student," Lott said. "Police officers make mistakes too. They're human and they need to be held accountable, and that's what we've done with Deputy Ben Fields."

The US Justice Department and Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) launched the probe on Tuesday to determine if the law enforcement officer violated federal civil rights laws during the brutal arrest on Monday.

Investigators began the probe after videos filmed by students showed Fields flipping an 18-year-old girl out of her chair and dragging her across a classroom for refusing a teacher's demand to put away her mobile phone.

The incident has sparked outrage on social media.

"They need to understand that when they call us, we're going to take a law enforcement action," Lott said. "Maybe that ought to have been something handled by the school without ever calling the deputy."

The sheriff, however, held the student accountable for initiating the whole incident by disrupting the school discipline.

"The student was not allowing the teacher to teach and not allowing the students to learn. She was very disrespectful and she started this whole incident," Lott said. "It doesn't justify his actions. But again, she needs to be held responsible for what she did."

Fields has a history of aggression against African-Americans.

In 2007, a black couple accused Fields, another deputy and Sheriff Lott of excessive force, false arrest and violation of free speech rights, but a jury ruled in Fields' favor.

The latest incident comes amid public outrage over several high-profile killings of unarmed African-Americans by white police officers in the last two years.