A former Middle School teacher has filed new sexual harassment allegations against the Watertown Schools.
Pam Smith, attorney for ex-teacher Victoria Crisp, said her client’s complaint has been revised to include allegations that female special education students skipped class to sleep in Watertown Police Officer Lloyd Burke’s office, went off campus with him for lunch and watched a strange Internet cartoon with bizarre dialogue. Burke allegedly even encouraged one of the students to call him “daddy,” the complaint read.
“I’ve received a number of phone calls [from parents],” Smith said. “So I filed an amended complaint based on what they told me.”
Leonard Kesten, an attorney representing the school system, said the new allegations grasp at straws.
“It’s an outrage this is being dragged into the lawsuit now,” he said. “It’s a sign of desperation to try and find other things that may have happened.”
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Crisp’s attorney said the amended filing comes after a “knee-jerk response” from the town.
Filed with the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination on Dec. 21, the complaint made by Crisp for sexual harassment, retaliatory wrongful discharge and defamation comes after she was ousted from her job as a special education teacher because she did not get the proper teaching license.
Crisp reports that since November 2004, she was a victim of various elements of harassment from both teachers and staff, which also included Assistant Principal Jason Del Porto and teacher Susan Sullivan. But she has based the majority of her case on the alleged actions of Burke, who had been assigned to patrolling the halls at the Middle School since 2002.
Both Del Porto and Sullivan could not be reached for comment before press time.
Police said Burke “reassigned himself” from the school after the complaint was made public.
Crisp accused Burke of making a lewd comment to her, watching inappropriate music videos with students and e-mailing her a photo from MySpace.com of one of her former female students scantily clad in her underwear. She reported that her initial complaints to the school date back to 2004 when Sullivan claimed that she and Burke had sex in one of the middle school classrooms. Del Porto has been accused by Crisp of sexual harassment, allegedly making “jokes” about the buttons on Crisp’s shirt being separated by the tension of her crutches she was on from breaking her right leg in 2005.
Crisp said that many of her complaints to the school were left unanswered with no actions, but Middle School Principal Kimo Carter has ensured parents in a letter that everything was fully investigated and continues to be.
The amended complaint also reads that in the spring of 2006, Burke used his computer to show female students “a macabre Internet cartoon about a strange, spidery creature who, before visiting a child, talks about his need to touch things that make him feel, in the creature’s words, ‘almost orgasmic.’”
Watertown Police Chief Edward Deveau could not be reached for comment. A call put in for Burke was unsuccessful.
According to Smith, those who file with the MCAD are allowed to “liberally amend” their case while it remains active within the system.
“People remember things [during the investigation process],” said MCAD spokesperson Elizabeth Forman. “It happens.”
Kesten said with Crisp’s case, tactics now are simply to “trash the officer” in every way possible. So far in his investigation talking with middle school teachers, nothing has come up that sends him a red flag, he said.
Kesten said he is in opposition to the amendment because it was never a part of Crisp’s original case.
Smith said the whole process has been “unsettling” for her client, who is still looking for another job.
A former teacher alleges a police officer allegedly watched a cartoon featuring the creepy creature Salad Fingers with female students. Judge for yourself at fat-pie.com/salad.htm.
