Seabrook, NEW HAMPSHIRE

LAWSUIT and why teachers are no longer considered professionals.
Finally settled after a year. And, God knows, how much money.

Oct 12, 2007 - Dianne Dunfey, a Seabrook Middle School 7th grade social studies teacher, is suing the district and the school principal for alleged retaliation for her refusal to stand for the Pledge of Allegiance.

The lawsuit was filed by Meyer and by the National Education Association-NH on Dunfey's behalf, according to Steven Sacks, a staff attorney with NEA-NH in Concord. NEA-NH and the local Seacoast Education Association support Dunfey in the case, Sacks said.

As well as legal advice, NEA-NH is helping to support Dunfey's case financially.

CASE SETTLED October 31, 2008 - School District Attorney Debra Weiss Ford of Portsmouth advised in court documents the case was settled on Oct. 31. An agreement for entry of judgment or a stipulation of dismissal is to be filed with the U.S. District Court by Dec. 3.

The terms were not known as of Friday. The newspaper tried to reach her attorney. National Education Association New Hampshire Attorney Steve Sacks, who also represented Dunfey, was out of the office on Friday.

Los Angeles, CALIFORNIA

Sometimes you have to dig for the story.

NEWS ITEM

October 21, 2008 - Three girls were awarded total of $1.6 million by a Los Angeles Superior Court panel. All three girls were inappropriately touched by the aide, Ricardo Guevara, when they were ages 5 and 6 while attending Miramonte Early Education Center in 2002-03, according to trial testimony.

The district admitted liability before the trial.

"In a trial of this matter, LAUSD acknowledged responsibility for the acts of a former employee and the damage he caused to the plaintiffs and their families," the statement reads. "In order to spare our students the need to recount and relive the details of the incidents, we stipulated to liability for the acts."

Guevara was convicted of molesting the girls and sentenced in September 2005 to 15 years to life in state prison.
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TT - What is missing in such stories is the reason why the school district was liable. You don't pay out $1.6 million because you kinda feel bad about the whole thing. Districts and their insurance carriers pay because they have to. Which meant they did something, or failed to do something, that left them liable for damages.

You have to search around for the probable reason. This Mercury News story includes information that the (Los Angeles) Daily Breeze found unimportant.

Guevara had been accused of molesting another Miramonte student previously. Sheriff's deputies investigated and he was removed from the classroom.

When prosecutors decided not to pursue the case, he returned to the school.

In fact, as the Los Angeles Times reported, Guervara was accused accused of molesting another Miramonte student in 2002 as well as another student in 1995.

Pittsburgh, PENNSYLVANIA

LAWSUIT

Not, mind you, that this will change anything. School districts will still perform their own "in house investigations" and ignore mandatory reporting laws that require them to notify police or child welfare agencies when they suspect abuse.

September 9, 2008 - A teacher wants claims against her in a federal lawsuit filed by the girl's family to be dismissed. Her attorney argues that she did not cause the harm when the 14-year-old girl was raped in a stairwell at the school in February, and did not have a constitutional duty to protect the girl from bodily harm because she did not work for the school district directly.

Esther von Waldow, formerly known as Esther Haguel, was hired to work in Upper St. Clair High School's special education program. The district said it contracted with von Waldow through Wesley Institute.

The lawsuit, filed June 30, claims the unnamed girl told von Waldow in January that a male student forced her to perform sex acts on and off campus. That month, the same boy was placed on three days' in-school suspension for inappropriate sexual behavior toward two other girls.

In February, the boy was arrested on charges of raping three girls -- including the plaintiff -- over a four-day period.

In yesterday's filing, von Waldow claims she warned school officials and sought better protection for the girl, including supervised walks to the bus.

"One is left to question what more would or should be required of an independent contractor employee than to promptly notify the officials and individual defendants on whom (the plaintiff's) safety depended," defense attorney Samuel Braver wrote. "(von Waldow) is the only individual defendant who took any action to notify school officials."

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tt - Previously, the school district, in asking for dismissal of the federal lawsuit, claimed the teacher was the only one who knew about the previous assaults on other students.

In court papers filed Tuesday, lawyers for the district and its employees said only one teacher -- an independent contractor employed by Wesley Institute -- knew about reports of previous assaults; therefore, the district should be freed of responsibility.

"There are no allegations that the individual defendants, excepting defendant Esther Haguel, were personally involved in any of the alleged conduct," lawyer Anthony Sanchez wrote, adding that the student who sued failed to show "she was injured by a known but uncorrected custom of reckless indifference to her constitutional rights."

The lawsuit claims the girl told teacher Esther Haguel, now known as Esther VonWaldow, that the boy assaulted her on two previous occasions. Both the girl and her alleged attacker were in special-education classes.

Five girls were attacked by the boy, the lawsuit claims, and at least three of them reported the incidents to school officials before the February attack. The lawsuit states that the boy was placed on three days' in-school suspension after two girls reported inappropriate behavior where he was required him to write notes of apology to them while serving the in-school suspension.

She and her parents contend that Ms. Haguel engaged the victims in discussions about the assaults -- trying to alter their understanding of them -- making Jane Doe feel "very uncomfortable."

The lawsuit accuses the district and staff of failing to contact police after each report of sexual assault, as is required by law.

July 3 - The Pittsburgh Gazette interviewed a 16-year-old girl who was also victimized by the boy. She said she asked school officials to notify police more than a month before at least three of her classmates were raped in a stairwell and hallway at school. That was in December. She notified her emotional support teacher at the school, Esther Haguel, that the boy had been aggressively pushing her up against the wall and fondling her nearly every day since late October.

After talking to Ms. Haguel, she told her parents, and Ms. Haguel took her to talk to the school's assistant principals, Jace Palmer and Louis Angelo. He was given the in-house suspension.

Wenatchee, WASHINGTON

"If Eastmont could not fire Lynn McCoy for the acts testified in this case, then heaven help our children." JURY DECIDES AGAINST TEACHER.

July 31, 2008 - Two parents filed assault charges against her.

"You'll find they were dedicated, honest administrators who were faced with a very difficult problem," [Eastmont attorney Jerry] Moberg said in his opening statement. "They were faced with a teacher who created enough havoc that not just a few parents but 20 or 30 parents who had individual complaints against the way their child was treated by Ms. McCoy. ... It's hard to fire a bad teacher, as you'll hear from the evidence."

Lynn McCoy, 57, taught at Cascade Elementary from 1991 until she was fired in March 2004.

Two principals tried to mention parent complaints in McCoy's evaluation but the comments were removed by the school superintendent. There were three investigations into McCoy's alleged mistreatment of children. The school district put McCoy on paid administrative leave for more than a year after two parents filed two separate misdemeanor assault charges.

A Douglas County district judge agreed in December 2003 to eventually dismiss the charges if McCoy committed no more offenses for a year.

McCoy is suing, claiming Eastmont school administrators retaliated against her for complaining too much. McCoy says administrators fired her in retaliation for the eight grievances she filed against at least three administrators and the school district in general, according to court documents.

According to court documents, McCoy's grievances included:
•Challenging negative comments in two annual evaluations
•Challenging the assistant superintendent's claim McCoy had a "pattern" of misconduct
•A grievance against the principal for creating a hostile work environment
•Two grievances against the district for not letting her attend union meetings on district property and not paying her attorney's fees in regard to the assault charges.

McCoy is currently executive director for the Wenatchee Valley Dispute Resolution Center.

JURY DECIDES IN FAVOR OF SCHOOL DISTRICT August 14 - Ten of 12 jurors Wednesday decided against Lynn McCoy's claim that the district fired her in retaliation for grievances she filed with the teachers union.

The school district claims McCoy was fired for probable cause that she assaulted two students and emotionally abused several others, [Eastmont School District attorney Jerry] Moberg said.

"If Eastmont could not fire Lynn McCoy for the acts testified in this case, then heaven help our children," Moberg said during closing arguments Wednesday.

About 40 parents complained about the treatment of children, Moberg said. Their complaints against McCoy included humiliation, breaking down self-esteem and excessive punishment.

Muskogee, OKLAHOMA

LAWSUIT -
Judge refuses to dismiss lawsuit.

August 8, 2008 - A civil rights lawsuit alleges that the Hilldale Public Schools system was negligent in supervising a former band teacher who raped a student. The 14-year-old girl’s parents filed the suit in U.S. District Court in Muskogee.

Hilldale was denied a dismissal of the case by U.S. District Judge James H. Payne. He ruled the district was aware of complaints against Giacomo, disbelieved a reporting student and even threatened the student with suspension. That student was then denied a transfer into the district, Payne wrote in his refusal to dismiss the case.

BACKGROUND Band instructor Danny Bryan Giacomo pleaded guilty in March to six counts of second-degree rape against the 14-year-old student. Giacomo also pleaded guilty to 10 other sexual-related felony acts against the 14-year-old and/or another Hilldale juvenile. He was sentenced to six years in prison and 29 years of probation.

He told the sentencing judge that the Hilldale Superintendent D.B. Merrill and former Assistant High School Principal knew of his behavior toward one of the students. In an affidavit, he said the two refused to allow a student who complained about the situation to return to Hilldale as a transfer student.

Both girls left Hilldale, one to be home schooled and the other to another school district.

An opinion and order in the case filed July 25 states when asked why he molested the 14-year-old, Giacomo testified: “I just felt I had the power — I could do it if I wanted to.”

TT entry for Giacomo.

Mesa, ARIZONA

This is a lawsuit we are not going to follow.

August 1, 2008 - Fractured skull caps wild trip

In an e-mail sent to parents June 11, 2007, Michael Forhan, Passports' director of corporate development, blamed DiMaggio for failing to control the group.

"In my 38 years in the travel industry, I have never encountered a student group that has exhibited such clear contempt for common rules of behavior," Forhan wrote.

Before the group of Dobson High School students left U.S. airspace on a flight last summer to London, the pilot threatened to land the plane in Newfoundland and throw them off if they kept drinking whiskey and vodka purchased during a layover in Cincinnati.

Mitchell, SOUTH DAKOTA

LAWSUIT decision.

June 24, 2008 - A former student is suing her former teacher and the Mitchell School District, alleging sexual harassment, discrimination and battery at the hands of her former teacher, Andy Tate, and liability on the part of the school district.
Full Name: Andrew Tate

The lawsuit that was filed in January claims Tate had a reputation for other inappropriate actions and conversations with students, and that the school district should have known about it and prevented it. Tate was not originally a defendant but was later added as a third-party defendant.

Jurors in the civil trial will not hear the criminal charges against Tate. Tate pleaded no contest.

Shortly after the 2006 encounter, Tate was charged with criminal stalking and resigned from the school. The details of those charges have never been fully reported, but there were allusions in the civil depositions to Tate allegedly following female students.

Tate originally pleaded not guilty to four criminal stalking charges but later pleaded no contest [in 2006] to one charge, and the other charges were dropped as part of a plea agreement. His sentence included jail time and a fine, but the crime will be wiped from his criminal record if he abides by the terms of a two-year probation period.

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WE FOUND:
April 22, 2008 - School officials traded obscene e-mails
Two e-mails send by the School Board President Bob Everson through the school district e-mail system emerged. One e-mail sent by Everson in December 2005 to Tate and Terry Aslesen — a former Mitchell High principal who now teaches there — is titled "Golf Attire."

The e-mail purports to ask members of a golf club to decide on a dress code. Attached are two images of three topless adult women photographed in golf settings.

A second e-mail, which Aslesen sent to Tate and two others in February 2006, is titled "Golf Tee's" and advises, "Use discretion when you open this." Attached are a photograph of another topless woman and a close-up photo of two breasts.

Lawyers for the school district have asked a judge to seal the e-mails from public view and will seek to keep them from reaching jurors.

Dec 13, 2007 - Supt. Discusses Charges Against Board Member
School board member Eric Christensen informed Mitchell's school superintendent last month that Christensen was the subject of a possible criminal investigation in connection with his former employer.
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TRIAL June 25 - The trial is expected to go into next week.

On Tuesday, a jury of nine women and three men heard about previous sex-related complaints regarding Tate.

Plamp's first witness, school counselor Judy Thiesse, said an unknown man complained to her in 1994 that a teacher was the reason his fiancee - a former Mitchell student - wouldn't have sex with him.

Terry Aslesen, who was principal at the time, said the man never identified the teacher, and he assumed the matter involved a lesson on abstinence."I had taken it as something the teacher had taught ... screwed up his fiancee's head, and she didn't want to have sex," said Aslesen, who remains friends with Tate.

Another former student, Tiffany Ellis, testified that Tate gave graphic descriptions of rapes during class lectures in 2005. She had nightmares and complained to the counselor and Principal Yvonne Palli.

"I found it disturbing that he could go into such graphic detail about these incidents over and over again," Ellis said. "There seemed to be a fascination to this."

Great posted comment at the story.

June 27 - Former Mitchell teacher explains actions in court (Argus Leader)
Judge John Simko granted the school district’s motion to throw out the part of the lawsuit concerning sexual harassment and discrimination. The judge found there was insufficient evidence that the district knew about improper conduct in Tate’s past and reacted with “deliberate indifference.”

The issue that remains before the jury is whether Tate committed sexual battery and whether he did so while acting within the scope of his employment.

DELIBERATIONS HALTED July 2 - The federal judge halted deliberations after a juror brought a dictionary to court.

Judge John Simko now is privately interviewing each juror to find out what, if any, use they made of the dictionary. Its use by the jury raises questions of whether jurors were influenced by its definition of certain terms, rather than by definitions and instructions provided to them by the court.

VERDICT July 2 - The jury returned with a unanimous decision that former teacher, Andrew Tate did commit battery against Brittany Plamp. But jurors also decided the Mitchell School District should not be held liable for his actions.

July 28, 2008 - Tate wants the Mitchell School District's insurance to cover the $25,000 in legal bills he spent to defend himself in a lawsuit brought by a former student.

The school district brought Tate into the lawsuit as a third-party defendant so that he could be forced to share in the payment of any damages awarded by a jury.

Earlier this year, Tate sued the Associated School Boards of South Dakota Protective Trust in state circuit court to seek coverage for legal costs he was incurring.

Foot Fetish

LAWSUIT and foot fetish games

June 26, 2008 - The Florida Department of Education is being sued by a young woman suffering from muscular dystrophy who alleges that a former counselor forced her to act out "master-slave" foot fetish fantasies.

The suit claims the department was negligent after hiring Steven Stocker because he was fired and pleaded guilty to a similar offense in Virginia in the early 1990s.

In 1992, Stocker was a principal in Fredericksburg, VA, where he was charged after he took a 9-year-old girl to his apartment, played games with the girl while calling her master and kissed her foot, according to the lawsuit. Later that year, Stocker was found guilty and ordered to pay a $1,000 fine.

Leaving Virginia, Stocker was hired as a teacher in Florida. In 1993, the school district fired him after a background check revealed that he had failed to disclose the suspension from Virginia public schools, according to the lawsuit.

He was hired to work with state's Department of Education's Division of Vocational Rehabilitation, where he was assigned to counsel a 19-year-old woman with muscular dystrophy. He was fired in April 2007 after a mental health counselor and close friend of the victim sent a written complaint about Stocker to the rehabilitation division's Tallahassee ombudsmen's office.

S.S. vs. the Florida Department of Education and Steven J. Stocker

Tomah, WASHINGTON

Insight into the cost of lawsuits for one school district.

June 19, 2008 - The Tomah School District recently lost two lawsuits, but not much money. The district’s financial liability is limited to a $2,000 deductible for each case.

Employee Mutual Casualty settled the first case for $37,000 in March. It was an Open Meeting Law case. In the second unrelated case, they paid $17,500 to the Alliance Defense Fund, which represented the student who challenged a classroom policy that prohibited religious imagery in any art project

Fasbender said the two cases won’t impact the district’s premium for errors and omissions. Last year, the district’s E&O premium was $4,239; this year, it’s $4,367.

New Orleans, LOUSIANA

Waste of taxpayer money. Who pays for all her lawyers?

June 18, 2008 - A teacher whose artwork on her website contained nude pictures of herself and sculptures made of sanitary napkins has lost another round in her lawsuit against the school board that fired her. A student complained about the "artwork."

A federal judge dismissed Heather Weather's lawsuit against the Lafayette Parish School Board without comment. Her lawsuit claims they violated her right to freedom of expression.

Today, a three-judge panel of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans affirmed the lower court's ruling.
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Their 2-page ruling is online. PDF
She was a substitute teacher at Comeaux High School when she was fired.

We also wondered who paid for the lawyers for the butt-painting Virginia high school teacher. These aren't First Amendment issues. They directly affect the quality of our schools by lowering the standards to accomodate the weirdos.

New Law in Hawaii

THE FULL STORY

License suspensions for sex offense convictions????
Not exactly.

June 13, 2008 - The Honolulu Advertiser had this Associated Press article: Teachers convicted of sex crimes face license suspensions (story in its entirety.)

Gov. Linda Lingle has signed into law a bill enabling the Hawaii Teacher Standards Board to suspend the teacher's license of a teacher convicted of a sexual offense.

Until now, misbehaving teachers could be fired. But they retained their licenses, meaning there was little to stop them from getting jobs elsewhere.

The board oversees the state's 12,000 active licensed teachers.

Across the country, sexual misconduct allegations led states to take action against the licenses of 2,570 educators from 2001 through 2005. The cases includes licenses that were revoked, denied and surrendered.

Licenses are often required when teachers move from one state to another. If a teacher's license hasn't been revoked, there's little stopping her or him from starting over.

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TT - What the bill actually does is somewhat better than the news article stated:

1. The law requires the court clerk to notify the board within ten days when a teacher is convicted;
2. allows the Board to immediately suspend a teacher's license without a hearing;
3. and immediately upon suspension, the board has to initiate proceedings in accordance with chapter 91 to permanently revoke an individual's license to teach.

The bill is SB 2080 text

ONLINE RESOURCE
Search for any bill by number or by search terms Here
Help and examples are at the bottom of the page.

(When you find the bill, you can see the text or the status. The status page includes links to all versions of a measure, the committee reports and testimonials.)

Columbus, GEORGIA

LAWSUIT

June 12, 2008 - When parents sued a school district after two girls were victims of a teacher, the Ledger-Enquirer asked for a copy of the letter from their attorney. The school district refused to release the claim for public record, arguing it was exempt from the Open Records Act, because it was a file similar to a medical record and contained information that would constitute an invasion of privacy.

The school district, represented by attorney Greg Ellington of the Hatcher-Stubbs firm, argued that the letter was exempt from the Open Records Act because it was a file “similar to a medical or veterinary record,” it contains information the release of which would constitute an invasion of privacy, disclosure of the letter would have a “chilling effect” on a channel of communication, and that a balancing test of public versus private interest would require nondisclosure.

A judge disagreed and ordered the letter be released.

Muscogee Superior Court Judge Frank Jordan Jr. Has ordered the school district to disclose the letter sent by the victim's attorney, saying the public policy behind the Open Record's Act dictated the records be opened.

The Letter The teacher is James Cypert Jr. TT - entry
---------------------- OPINION ----------------------
TT - Needless to say, we are all for lawsuits. Sometimes it is the only way to force a change of attitude on schools. Monetarily, it doesn't cost the taxpayer because all school districts are insured. (Where the insurance carrier will not pay the damages is when parents and taxpayers ought to scream, "Why not?"

We would feel a lot better if the settlements were public. If the school district settles, it will be because they acknowledge wrongdoing. It is in the public interest to know what that was.

Seattle, WASHINGTON

STORY OF THE DAY

One teacher said, "I know that I can't rely on my employer to protect kids."

June 4, 2008 - From the Seattle Times: School's culture failed to stop abuser, written by Jonathan Martin and Ken Armstrong was described by The Oregonian as an "outrage story."

From the Seattle Times' story:

In April, Seattle Public Schools settled a lawsuit filed on behalf of two of Hill's victims for $3 million. Depositions, personnel files and other records from that lawsuit expose a school's culture of fear and confusion, and they explain how Hill managed to remain a teacher for so long.

At least 30 times since the late 1980s, teachers and staff warned administrators at North Seattle's Broadview-Thomson Elementary School of their suspicions about Hill, lawyers for the two girls say. The Seattle School District disputes that figure but does admit to five warnings.

State law requires school personnel to report suspected abuse to police or Child Protective Services, but teachers kept their concerns in-house, hewing to a school policy that says go to an administrator. Once passed along, their complaints almost always died, with no investigation, no discipline, no calls to outside investigators.

Teachers who'd witnessed Hill's troubling behavior struggled with what to do. And, due to principals' lax documentation, their concerns weren't pieced together to reveal Hill for what he was.

Hill, now 58, left behind a host of teachers disillusioned about their school district — and fearful the same thing could happen again. One teacher, Mollie Boswell, said later: "I know that I can't rely on my employer to protect kids."

Read the whole thing.
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TT - The story is by no means an isolated case because we have seen it repeated over and over again in one variant or another. It's the reason why school districts pay out millions to victims and their families. Because they have to. Usually, however, you don't find out what the school did that caused them to be liable. And, convenient for them, no local newspaper demands answers. The Seattle Times, however, filed a public records request to gain access to depositions and other documents from a lawsuit that exposed the reasons why the school district paid $3 million to the family of two girls.

Noisy, vociferous, uninformed parent protests on behalf of a "popular teacher" created timid administrators who wanted to avoid the confrontation, followed by administrators who didn't want to tackle the job, helped to set up a pattern that warned teachers how useless it was to complain. Nevertheless, they did.

At least 15 teachers and staff reported inappropriate behavior to successive school administrators. Teachers knew they were to contact Child Protective Services when they suspected a parent of molesting a child but when a teacher was suspected of the same thing they were supposed to notify an administrator.

Administrators did not document the complaints nor, apparently, investigate the allegations.

Insane school district policies dictated by teacher union contracts serve to protect the teacher at the expense of the student. Under the current teachers' contract, schools must destroy personnel files at the end of each year and start anew. Only records forwarded to the central office remain. Even the "new" training is utterly useless, leaving teachers more puzzled than before.

Shamefully, no administrator will be charged for failing to follow mandatory reporting requirements. Ironically, failing to document teacher complaints helps to insulate an administrator from criminal prosecution.

Meanwhile, Laurence "Shayne" Hill molested these two girls for years.

In the classroom.

He ultimately admitted molesting up to 13 girls — and in 2005 was sentenced to five years to life. Entry for Hill

Westport, CONNECTICUT

It's always amazing that when a woman files a complaint after graduation, male defenders of the teacher - and they are always male defenders - ask why she took so long to contact police. It's not a question anyone asks of those abused by priests.

May 23, 2008 - A 22-year-old woman is suing Westport school officials claiming they failed to protect her and that school officials allowed the former teacher, Peter Eramo Jr., of Milford, to remain a teacher despite prior complaints.

A criminal case is pending against Eramo who was arrested in October 2004 on a second-degree sexual assault charge. Authorities allege that the theater teacher had sex with the girl when she was a junior at Staples High School.

Oct 4, 2006 - Former Staples Teacher Charged in Sex Assault of Student

Eramo, who was let go by the Westport school system in 2003 for “inappropriate behavior” according to the court affidavit, was released on $10,000 bond and is expected to appear again in court Oct. 31, the Post said.

Westport Schools Superintendent Elliott Landon today disputed that Eramo was discharged for “inappropriate behavior,” saying that he resigned.

October 5, 2006 - School Officials Upset Over Erroneous Sex Assault Report
Westport school officials said today they were upset over an erroneous newspaper report that a former Staples High School teacher accused of sexually assaulting a student was involved in the school’s theater program. They stress he was an English teacher.

Oct 17, 2006 - Former Staples Teacher Suspended from L.I. Job
Eramo was suspended from his English teaching job at Lindenhurst (N.Y.) Senior High School after he was arrested and charged with second-degree sexual assault. Connecticut authorities say that in 2003, while Eramo was a teacher at Staples High School, he had sex with the student after a night of drinking in New York City.

Eramo's next court date on that case is June 9.

Seattle, WASHINGTON

LAWSUIT

April 7, 2008 - Seattle Public Schools agreed to pay $3.05 million to victims of an elementary-school teacher who molested students over his 30 years teaching for the district.

A lawsuit filed on behalf of two victims accused the district and a former principal of ignoring complaints about Laurence E. "Shayne" Hill for years. According to charging papers, at least three school administrators or principals had previously talked to Hill about inappropriately touching students.

From the Seattle Post-Intelligencer (April 7):

School district spokeswoman Patty Spencer says the district accepts responsibility for the actions of its former employee. She adds that the district revised its training in 2006 for working with students, including guidelines for reporting misconduct to outside authorities.

According to court documents, Hill's misconduct spanned nearly 20 years, with least 15 teachers and staff reporting inappropriate behavior to successive school administrators.

Seattle Times (April 8) - Three principals and even the superintendent ignored 30 reports from at least 15 other teachers about Hill, according to the lawsuit. The settlement is paid out of a risk-management pool that operates like an insurance policy for the district.

Post-Intelligencer (April 8) - Two of the school administrators accused of failing to act on warnings about Hill are still employed by the school district. District spokeswoman Patti Spencer would not comment on whether any administrators had been disciplined in relation to the case.

Terri Skjei, a former assistant principal and principal at Broadview-Thomson who was named a defendant in the lawsuit, is now principal at Viewridge Elementary. Jeanne Smart became principal at Broadview-Thomson about a year before Hill was caught and remains at the school.

KOMOTv: Seattle Public Schools to pay $3M in sex abuse case
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TT entry for Hill

RANT OF THE DAY
TT - School districts and their insurance carriers don't settle lawsuits because they are generous and good-hearted. They settle because of wrongdoing that is covered up by non-disclosure agreements in lawsuits that prevent public disclosure. The result is that those responsible are never brought to public view and their actions are never publicly admitted. The result is that no laws are ever passed that guarantee it won't happen again.

Hill sexually exploited children for thirty years and three school administrators or principals talked to him but chose to leave him in the classroom to molest other children.

The question is why. The answer is simple: because they could and because they, like many educators, think that they, personally, are above the law and in schools, they are the law. No law written by your elected representative to protect you and your child should be willfully ignored by educrats. No decency should be ignored. No school administrator or principal should be shielded from personal lawsuits that strip them of their life savings, their homes, their retirements and their role in a community when they choose convenience or personal power over responsibility and decency.

Mt. Vernon, GEORGIA

This is one of those outrageous stories that we seemed to have missed last year.

April 4, 2008 -
Carrie O'Conner, 33, a Montgomery County high school counselor, was indicted by a grand jury in December 2007 on a charge of sexual assault against a student by a school teacher or administrator. According to the indictment, O'Conner and the 16-year-old student allegedly had a sexual relationship from the beginning of January until the end of July.

She was arrested in August 2007.

From the Dec 11, 2007 story:

A student reported the abuse to a teacher and a probation officer working at the school in March.The teacher and officer avoided reporting the incident to Montgomery schools superintendent Dale Clark because she is the counselor's mother.

The case was turned over to the Georgia Bureau of Investigation (GBI).

O'Conner was suspended for a short time in March, but continued working at the school through the end of the year and returned as a counselor for the 2007 school year.

When the GBI requested all contact stop between O'Conner and the student last Tuesday, Principal Luke Smith sent a letter to the boy's parents.

He wrote that the boy would be sent to the alternative school until the GBI completed its investigation. Meanwhile O'Conner could remain counseling at the high school.But on Wednesday, the school's lawyers said the student could return to school as long as he and O'Conner stayed separated.

On Monday, GBI investigators removed O'Connor from the school.

April 4, 2008 - The mother dropped her lawsuit against the against the Montgomery County Board of Education, the teacher and the superintendent.. Her lawyers filed a dismissal without prejudice last week, which means she can re-file the case in the future.

TEACHING CREDENTIALS REVOKED in 2007 Sept 18, 2007 - The Georgia Professional Standards Commission voted last week to revoke O'Conner's teaching credentials and those of her mother, Superintendent Dale Clark.

Clark, who is legally able to continue as superintendent while the ruling is being appealed, has been suspended with pay by the Montgomery County school board.

O'Connor is awaiting trial and a jury is expected to hear her case in August or in February 2009.

Claymont, DELAWARE

Headline: "Boy Claims Teacher Made Him Witness Classmate's Rape"

LAWSUIT #2 March 20, 2008 - It's one of the claims in the new lawsuit against a Delaware school district and a convicted child rapist who used to work there. The suit is also against former Superintendent Bruce Harter.

The lawsuit charges that Brandywine School District failed to do a proper background check when hiring Holt, as she had been employed at four different schools in five years, which lawyers say should have raised a red flag.

The lawsuit further charges that for months prior to the sexual abuse, the Board of Education and its agents had received multiple reports of Holt's inappropriate conduct from volunteers, Claymont Elementary school officials and employees, including reports of Holt kissing students, sitting in students' laps in the classroom and dancing on classroom tables.

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TT entry for Rachel Holt, who was sentenced to 10 years.
TT entry for lawsuit #1
TT entry for confidental settlement with school counselor.

Seaford, DELAWARE

LAWSUIT

March 14, 2008 - A former student is suing Michael A. Wallace, 34, a Seaford Middle School softball coach for injecting a 14-year-old girl with a shot of adrenaline that she carried for asthma. The Seaford School District is also named in the suit for for failing to “properly and thoroughly” verify Wallace’s background.

Wallace's contract was not renewed following the end of the 2005-2006 school session. He was convicted March 8, 2007, of third-degree assault - a misdemeanor. He was sentenced to 30 days in prison, a year probation and made to pay more than $17,000 in restitution.

Bolivia, NORTH CAROLINA

Bad eggs may be uncommon in teachers. Inept school officials are all too common.

March 5, 2008 - A teacher, we are told, stood up for her peers. At a school board meeting. She was the Brunswick County Schools' Teacher of the Year.

TT - Unfortunately, for the touchy feely story, Brunswick County Schools has not had a banner year and being Teacher of the Year for that school district isn't exactly an accolate you can pin on your chest. From the story:

Brunswick County Schools has received one black eye after another dating back to late 2006.

That's when an assistant principal at North Brunswick High School was fired after being charged with possession of marijuana and indecent exposure while attending a school-related conference in Atlantic Beach, N.C. [That would be Greg Morris. TT entry.]

Last summer, former South Brunswick coach and teacher Brenton Wuchae gained national attention when he resigned from his job and later the same day married one of his [16-year-old] students, Windy Hager. [The teacher was 40 years old.]

Hager's parents are suing the Board of Education, accusing them of not doing enough to prevent the two from having a relationship. The parents authorized their then-16-year-old daughter to marry Wuchae.

TT - The father tried for eight months to get the board to act to quell the relationship between the teacher and his daughter. It was the fourth case involving inappropriate relations between an employee at a Brunswick County high school and a minor in the past year.

THREE - count 'em - three lawsuits have been filed against the district, including one where a 74-year-old janitor was allowed to retire - with benefits. He pleaded guilty to seven counts of sexual offenses with a male student and six counts of indecent liberties with a child. Collis Hewett is awaiting sentencing.

Another set of parents suing the school board are claiming a West Brunswick High School teacher acted inappropriately with their daughter. That teacher was David Arrowood. TT - entry.

Mar 6 - A Brunswick County teachers' aide who also served as a bus driver was fired for allowing a boy to sit in urine-soaked clothing for about three hours.

LAWSUIT DISMISSED June 11, 2008 - Brunswick Superior Court Judge Thomas Lock dismissed a high-profile lawsuit Monday that was filed against the Brunswick County Board of Education by the parents of a girl who married her track coach. Defense attorney Kathleen Tanner argued that the board of education is immune and cannot be held liable in a case like this.

The judge also dismissed a suit Monday the parents had filed against their daughter's husband, Brenton Wuchae.

San Antonio, TEXAS

Teachers are not hourly employees.

Mar 3, 2008 - Richard A. Middleton is superintendent of the North East Independent School District, writing in the San Antonio Express-News explains why the district has refused to pay a teacher for attending graduation ceremonies and what the precedent will mean.

Federal law classifies teachers as professional employees. As professionals, their salary reflects all the duties asked of them during a 10-month period and is not based on the hours it takes to complete those tasks. In Kelley's case, he was contracted for 10 months of service. Accordingly, for his salary, Kelley owed the district and the public those three hours.

A teacher's primary job is in the classroom teaching our children. Additionally, they have other essential duties and requirements, like providing tutoring and attending training sessions to improve the quality of instruction for our students. These responsibilities cannot be done during the school day. On their own initiative, our dedicated teachers work after school, on Saturdays and during breaks to get the job done.

As professionals in the private sector know, a salaried employee often works on weekends or after regular business hours to complete the job. Because you are a salaried employee, not hourly, you do not get paid additional funds for overtime.

What Kelley and the union want from the district, and from the public, is to get paid an extra full day of salary for attending a three-hour graduation ceremony. Thousands of teachers in NEISD have agreed to work a 10-month schedule. If that promise is broken, school districts will be forced to pay extra for any work done outside the regular school day.