Teacher Left Trail Of Misconduct Allegations In Various States

Saturday, October 20th 2007, 1:34 pm

By: News On 6

LAWTON, Okla. (AP) _ When former Oklahoma teacher Hector Ramirez applied to teach Spanish in the quiet Florida town of Port St. Lucie, school district administrators thought he would be a good hire. He had glowing recommendations from school officials in Lawton and years of experience as a teacher and coach.

What Ramirez and some of his former bosses failed to officially tell St. Lucie County school administrators was that he was fleeing allegations that he'd had an inappropriate relationship with a female student in Oklahoma and a sexual relationship with one in Georgia. And while the Oklahoma case was kept quiet and criminal charges were dropped in Georgia, the allegations alone would have been enough to prevent him from getting a Florida teacher's license if school administrators had known.

Ramirez's case shows the difficulty administrators face in tracking sexual misconduct allegations against teachers who cross state lines. There is no national government-run clearinghouse to alert officials to teacher misconduct and there is no guarantee that districts will report allegations to each other.

An investigation by The Associated Press, which reviewed documents obtained from the state through an Open Records request, shows that from 2001-2005 Oklahoma revoked, denied or suspended the teaching licenses of 28 teachers for sexual misconduct. But there likely are dozens more teachers, like Ramirez, who were allowed to quietly resign after allegations of misconduct surfaced.

``That's really a school board issue. We don't have any authority over hiring or dismissal,'' said Ramona Paul, assistant state superintendent for the Oklahoma Department of Education. ``School districts can report to us if a person is dismissed, but the cause is not an issue that is recorded.

``The Legislature has not said to us that we need to maintain that data.''

Oklahoma's figures were gathered as part of a seven-month investigation in which AP reporters sought records on teacher discipline in all 50 states and the District of Columbia.

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

Young people were victims in at least 69 percent of the cases, and the large majority of those were students.

Nine out of 10 of those abusive educators were male. And at least 446 of the abusive teachers had multiple victims.

There are about 3 million public school teachers in the United States.

Ramirez's case highlights the difficulty in determining whether teachers who are accused of sexual misconduct are really a predator or a victim themselves. He has denied both accusations against him and he has never been convicted of a crime.

``I am an innocent man,'' said Ramirez, who now works in the social services and no longer teaches.

Ramirez's teaching career began in Waurika, Okla., where he taught for one year before moving to nearby Lawton. There, he became the head coach for the girls' soccer team and assisted with other girls' teams. The Spanish teacher earned praise from his colleagues and even was named a department chairman in 1999.

But that year, officials say, a 16-year-old girl complained to Cynthia Walker, then-principal at Lawton Senior High School. She said Ramirez kissed her and made unwanted comments about her body, Oklahoma documents say. She said he also made comments that sounded to her as if her grade depended on how much she liked him, according to the documents.

According to his personnel file, Walker wrote Ramirez a memo that an internal investigation found probable cause to support allegations of misconduct with a student. She wrote that she had also discussed the issue with him.

The girl's parents did not want to pursue the allegations criminally, so Ramirez was urged to resign, said Chuck Wade, a lawyer for the Lawton Public Schools.

Wade refused to release any documents from Ramirez's personnel file connected to the investigation of alleged misconduct, but The Associated Press obtained the documents from school officials in Georgia.

Ramirez said those sexual misconduct allegations are false and that neither Walker nor anyone else ever accused him of that. He says he quit a week before winter break in 1999 because he was accused of insubordination stemming from disciplinary problems he had with a male student. He says no one ever mentioned the girl.

``It didn't bother me because I think things happen for a reason,'' Ramirez said. ``It was time to leave.''

Ramirez, his wife and two children headed to Georgia, where he applied to teach Spanish and coach soccer at Rockdale County High School in suburban Atlanta. Two weeks after Ramirez left Oklahoma, Rockdale administrators called Walker and she gave him a good recommendation. She never mentioned the accusations of sexual misconduct.

``She just asked me a question, 'Was he a good classroom teacher?' and I said, 'Yes,''' said Walker, now the curriculum director in the Lawton school district. ``Students and parents did love him. There was just the one student who made the allegation of the inappropriate relationship.''

Paul, Oklahoma's assistant state superintendent, said school officials are often limited about what they can say about a former teacher's job performance.

``That's very difficult because of other (employment) laws,'' Paul said. ``If someone calls and asks about an employee's history, if we give out specific kinds of information, we could be challenged that we did not protect them. School boards are under similar kinds of laws.''

Ramirez taught for a semester at Rockdale without incident. He then moved to Montgomery County High School in Mount Vernon, Ga., where one student says he soon began taking a special interest in her.

Now 23 and married with two children, the woman said she considered Ramirez to be her mentor, someone she respected. He would tell her she was smart, pretty and mature for her age, she said.

Their relationship was intimate, she said. She says there were phone calls and notes. He sent electronic greeting cards, she said.

``We exchanged a lot of e-mails, some hinted around having feelings for each other,'' said the woman, who agreed to talk on condition of anonymity because she didn't want her past to hurt her present life. ``He would tell me he loved me.''

Superintendent Dale Clark says that in October 2001, the girl told him that she and Ramirez had sex twice. Ramirez was arrested that day, charged with sexual assault, and immediately resigned, Clark said.

His 2003 trial ended with a mistrial, the jury hanging 11-1 for acquittal, said his lawyer, Francis Stubbs.

The charges were dropped.

The student said she was shocked at the outcome of the trial.

``I just do not understand how 12 jurors could sit there and think I made this up,'' she said. ``I know it happened. I was there.''

Ramirez headed south to Florida, where he applied at the St. Lucie County school district. On his application for a Florida Educator's Certificate, Ramirez did not mention the previous allegations.

Susan Ranew, Port St. Lucie County School Board's assistant superintendent of human resources, said Ramirez's references checked out and that Clark returned a form saying he had demonstrated successful teaching experience. Lawton Public Schools said he did not have a successful teaching experience.

Clark admitted filling out the form, but insists she also called St. Lucie County officials to tell them about Ramirez's past. Ranew said there is no record of such a communication, but said it could have happened.

Ramirez was hired to teach Spanish at Fort Pierce Central High School for the 2003-2004 school year. He had been there a few months with no problems when St. Lucie officials say they learned about the Georgia allegations. He was transferred to a desk job away from students and fired at the end of the school year, Ranew said.

Ranew said she doesn't think the school board could have done anything differently. Laws in each state differ in what is public information in a teacher's personnel file and standards also vary, she said.

Ramirez still says he is innocent of both allegations and said he learned a lesson from the experience.

``Be careful who you trust,'' he said. ``There is always two stories for everything.''