School board member Aguiar claims police chief alleged a coverup of school sex misconduct

Yahoo

18-05-2025

(This story has been updated to correct an inaccuracy.)
FALL RIVER — School Committee member Kevin Aguiar submitted a letter to the school board at its May 12 meeting, alleging that new Police Chief Kelly Furtado had made comments several years ago, when she was a school resource officer, that Mayor Paul Coogan and former B.M.C. Durfee High School administrators covered up 'sexually inappropriate situations with students.'
Aguiar's letter, which was read during public input, said the matter was spoken about with 'high-ranking' officials serving on the Fall River Police Department, and that he had shared additional details with Superintendent Tracy Curley and school board members.
Aguiar's letter read, 'I am now formally requesting an independent investigation to ensure all matters of sexual harassment, past and present, are handled appropriately and transparently.'
Coogan, chairman of the Fall River School Committee, and who was assistant principal at Durfee High at the time, called the claim of sexual misconduct coverup "outrageous slander."
Furtado gets the gig: Fall River appoints Kelly Furtado, first female police chief in history. What to know.
Coogan said he anticipates receiving follow-up reports stemming from official police reports and other law enforcement agencies. He said the Department of Children and Families ought to have been contacted about this matter.
Coogan said he assumed Aguiar, as a mandated reporter, would have cooperated with reporting the alleged incidents so as 'not to jeopardize anything in his future.'
Aguiar struck back, saying he knew of no 'specific case' and no students have been identified, but saying his concerns lay with an alleged coverup.
According to an email Furtado sent to Coogan, Furtado admitted having made a facetious remark at the time of planning for the construction of the new Durfee building on Elsbree Street.
In the email, Furtado wrote that she had joked 'two rapes a day' were likely if builders used an 'open bathroom' concept in the new building.
In a Herald News interview May 14, Coogan explained that the open bathroom concept featured more isolated, private spaces with no entryway doors between gendered bathrooms, where students could enter the bathrooms and turn right or left.
Defending Gauvin: Aguiar: Fall River ex-police chief victim of 'smearing'; father's guns found in locker
In an interview May 15, Furtado said her remarks about the bathrooms were made to former Police Chief Paul Gauvin's wife at a police department gala.
Coogan acknowledged the remarks and said Furtado had been looking at the building design through the eyes of a school resource officer, with student safety front of mind.
Regarding the rumors being brought to the School Committee, Furtado said "I'm appalled," but "not shocked at this behavior."
Furtado said she has, in part, dedicated her career to "championing children's safety," and said even the suggestion that she would allow a criminal offense, such as rape, to occur "is demonstrably false."
Aguiar claimed Furtado reported sexual misconduct coverup allegations to Gauvin during the time Gauvin was captain and to Deputy Chief J.T. Hoar and Deputy Chief Barden Castro.
Coogan said Gauvin shared Furtado's remarks with him shortly after he was first elected mayor, when Furtado was "up for a promotion." Coogan remembered Gauvin had mentioned the remarks in line with discussing her candidacy for a new role within the department.
Gauvin, when contacted, said he believed the gala when Furtado's remarks were heard was in 2018. "I attempted to step in when this was going on," Gauvin said.
He maintained that he alerted Coogan to the matter: 'I can't tell you how many times, but it was a lot. He was well-informed,' Gauvin said.
'Nobody that I've talked to about this matter since 2018 has ever mentioned they thought it was a joke. No one has ever mentioned anything about bathrooms,' he said.
Tensions have been high between Gauvin and Furtado, who took over the chief's position on an interim basis in October 2024 shortly after both the patrolmen's and officers' unions took votes of no confidence in Gauvin's leadership. Gauvin was fired in early April after an investigation found Gauvin left a "threatening" note to Furtado in her desk and improperly stored three weapons not owned by him in his locker. On April 11, Aguiar revealed he or someone in his family had given those guns to Gauvin and that they had been owned by his father, Daniel Aguiar.
At the meeting, Aguiar called for an outside investigation to audit past and present instances of sexual harassment and violence where students were victims.
In an interview, Coogan said he has a record of instances of sexual misdemeanors at Durfee High during the years in question, and the number of incidents is far fewer than what Furtado's alleged remarks claimed. Nearly all of them occurred between students, Coogan said. In every case, Coogan said, the incident was reported to the appropriate authorities; in some escalated situations, he said, the incident prompted him to notify police immediately.
"I want the parents to know and I want the children to know: There were no two rapes a week at Durfee High School. It's outrageous," Coogan said at the board's meeting.
Coogan called Aguiar's insinuations of a coverup 'a travesty.'
'He sent this letter to the attorney,' Coogan said, citing Bruce Assad, the attorney who represents the school board.
'This School Committee can vote to investigate a situation,' Aguiar said. 'Let's do an outside investigation if no one has anything to hide.'
Coogan said if the allegations were true, and two rapes had occurred on a weekly basis — incorrectly stating Furtado's remarks of two rapes a day — and were covered up, 'that would be 70 rapes a year,' Coogan said. 'It's outrageous.'
Coogan said Aguiar was slandering students, teachers and staff, and what he was doing was 'hurtful' to parents and the school system at large.
If an investigation is conducted, 'He will find out that none of this is true,' Coogan said, assuming Aguiar heard the allegations secondhand.
In terse exchanges with Aguiar, Coogan asked that if Gauvin and other police deputies had known about any incidents, why was nothing done about them?
School Committee member Thomas Khoury recalled his time as a school adjustment councilor at the time Coogan served as the assistant principal, and said on many occasions Coogan and Khoury's work 'saved so many kids, kids who were in crisis.'
'I heard absolutely nothing,' Khoury said, about incidents that rose to the severity of rape.
School Committee member Mimi Larrivee expressed concerns that using kids as pawns in political rumors was 'gross.'
In an interview May 15, Aguiar claimed to have alerted school board members to the old rumors for months.
School Committee member Bobby Bailey called for a consistent protocol to investigate criminal-level incidents.
Bruce Assad clarified that the School Committee does not have any power to conduct its own investigation, and that as committee members, they are mandated reporters, and ought to report "any credible evidence" to the appropriate law enforcement agencies.
Coogan said he welcomes an investigation by the city's police department.
'My position is this never went on. ... The only one writing about this is you,' he told Aguiar. "[Gauvin's] comments are from 2018," he said.
This article originally appeared on The Herald News: Fall River to investigate old rumors of sexual misconduct at Durfee