Teacher Suspended After Public Confrontation With Student at Her Job
A Vancouver Island teacher has been suspended and was ordered to complete boundaries training after the provincial regulator found his interactions with a student while out in the community to be 'unbecoming.'
Nanaimo-Ladysmith school district high school teacher Edward John Thomas Mulrooney was suspended for five days in connection with a February 2021 incident that led to a confrontation with the student later that year while she was at work.
Mulrooney admitted to the incidents deemed to be professional misconduct by the British Columbia Commissioner for Teacher Regulator in a
dated April 7 and posted online this week.
The school district initially suspended Mulrooney following reports that he looked at a female student, known as Student A, in the hallway in a manner that made her uncomfortable, the decision says. The student and two of her peers believed Mulrooney looked at her 'in a way that was 'checking her out,'' according to the document.
During the suspension and the district's investigation into the student's claim, he was instructed to refrain from discussing the investigation with any students or staff members.
The suspension came a few months after Mulrooney was issued a 'letter of expectation' by the district 'regarding the need to maintain an appropriate and consistent level of professionalism when interacting with students,' the agreement
reads
.
Related Stories
1/22/2025
1/11/2025
While the investigation was still in progress, Mulrooney had an altercation with the student in July 2021 at her place of employment.
Mulrooney paid a visit to a local business, not realizing that the student in question was working there as a cashier, the agreement says. He said he didn't recognize her because she was wearing a COVID mask.
'When Mulrooney was at the check-out till, he believed that Student A was 'playing games' with him and not treating him very well,' the agreement says.
'Mulrooney asked Student A for her name, because she was not wearing a name tag. Student A told Mulrooney her name. Mulrooney said 'ohhh, we have never met before,' then wagged his finger at her and told her to 'stop your little lies.''
Another cashier intervened and told Mulrooney not to address the student in that manner, to which he responded, 'I think if you knew the kind of life I have had to live the last year, you'd think differently,' the report states.
Mulrooney 'raised his voice, was visibly angry, and made disrespectful comments,' and told the student to start telling the truth, the document says. He then threatened to speak to a manager, saying that she 'should not be working when he could not work.'
When the store manager approached to ask if there was an issue, Mulrooney brought up the student's allegation, said he could lose his job, and insisted that the student be fired. Mulrooney also phoned the business at a later time to demand the student's termination, the agreement says.
Mulrooney resigned from the school district in April 2022, and the provincial commissioner initiated an inquiry into his behaviour in May of that year. He was issued a citation in February of this year.
'His interaction with Student A at her place of employment occurred in a public setting, he referred to his status as a teacher, and he was loud, threatening and intimidating,' the document reads. 'His actions were contrary to his responsibility as a role model, and his obligation to maintain the integrity and reputation of the profession.'
The commissioner opted to suspend Mulrooney's teaching certification for five days, from May 5 to May 9. He is also required to complete the Reinforcing Respectful Professional Boundaries course at the Justice Institute of B.C. The regulator said failure to fulfill this requirement may result in an extended suspension of his license.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
2 hours ago
- Yahoo
Man admits causing death of pregnant woman's unborn child in horror crash
A 20-year-old man has pleaded guilty to causing death by dangerous driving after he hit a pregnant woman whose baby later died in hospital. Ashir Shahid, of Windsor Road, Walton le Dale, Lancashire, pleaded guilty to the charge at Preston Crown Court on Wednesday (June 4). Shahid was driving on Station Road in Bamber Bridge, south of Preston, on the evening of September 29 last year. READ MORE: Did anyone win Euromillions £208 million jackpot on Friday night? READ MORE: How the new Covid variant NB.1.8.1 in UK is different to Omicron A woman in her 30s from Bamber Bridge was on the pedestrian crossing when she was hit. Lancashire Police said she was left with serious injuries and is still recovering. The woman was pregnant at the time and, despite undergoing emergency surgery to have her baby boy delivered, he tragically later died in hospital. Following enquires, Shahid was arrested and subsequently charged with causing death by dangerous driving and causing serious injury by dangerous driving. He pleaded guilty to both charges. A 16-year-old boy from Walton le Dale, who cannot be named for legal reasons, appeared in the dock alongside Shahid and pleaded guilty to assisting an offender. Shahid was remanded into custody to be sentenced on August 14 at the same court. The 16-year-old will be sentenced at the same time.
Yahoo
3 hours ago
- Yahoo
Lewiston Party House defendant seeks dismissal
LOCKPORT — The man who previously pleaded guilty to charges of providing booze and pot to teenagers in a Mountain View Drive home that became known as the 'Lewiston Party House' is asking to have his case dismissed. Gary Sullo, 58, has appealed to Niagara County Court Judge John Ottaviano, asking to have the charges he has already admitted to — and been sentenced for — thrown out because he claims his constitutional rights to a speedy trial were denied. Lawyers for Sullo and Niagara County District Attorney Brian Seaman argued the appeal before Ottaviano on Wednesday. Defense attorney Jessica Kulpit told the judge that after Sullo was first charged in 2018 it took '4 years, 9 months and 8 days' to resolve his case. 'There is no universe I can think of where it takes 5 years to resolve a misdemeanor case,' Kulpit said. While admitting that proceedings in the case were impacted by restrictions imposed as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, Kulpit insisted that 'the Town of Lewiston Court did nothing, without explanation, the court did nothing (to advance the case). This is a deprivation of constitutional rights.' Sullo was sentenced by Lewiston Town Justice Hugh Gee to three years probation for his guilty plea to misdemeanor charges for providing alcohol and marijuana to teenagers in the home he shared with his late wife Tricia Vacanti, who was also originally charged in the case. His sentencing came more than six years after the first reports of booze and drug-fueled teenage parties at the home. Sullo was charged with multiple counts of endangering the welfare of a child and unlawful dealing with a child but ultimately pleaded guilty to just two counts of endangering the welfare of a child in a deal with Niagara County prosecutors. At the time of that deal, Sullo had filed a motion in Lewiston court to have the case dismissed, arguing that his speedy trial rights had been violated. Before prosecutors could respond to that motion, and before Gee could issue a ruling on it, Sullo reportedly emailed the judge and said he wanted to take the DA's plea offer. Kulpit said that despite her client's decision to take the prosecutor's offer, the request to have the case dismissed should have been ruled on in the Lewiston court. She said Sullo always expected to get a ruling. 'He took the plea believing he could still appeal,' Kulpit said. Assistant Niagara County District Attorney Laura Jordon told Ottaviano that Sullo has no right to appeal. 'The case law is clear,' Jordan told the judge. 'A guilty plea precludes a (speedy trial) appeal.' Jordan also said all of the delays in the case, before Sullo's guilty plea, were a result of either Covid restrictions or requests from his defense attorney. 'Not a single delay was attributable to the people,' Jordan said. 'The record (in the case) shows all those delays, outside of Covid, were at the defendant's request.' Sullo's sentencing followed the sentencing of the other remaining adult in the case, Jessica Long. Long, 43, was sentenced by Gee in January 2024 to six months of interim probation for her guilty plea to one count of first-degree unlawfully dealing with a child. Vacanti had faced 41 counts of unlawfully dealing with a minor and endangering the welfare of a child in connection with the house parties. But she died suddenly on July 3, 2022, and the charges against her were set aside. Specifically, Vacanti had been accused of providing booze and pot to at least three teenage girls, who later claimed they were sexually assaulted in her home by her then-teenage son, Christopher Belter. Belter was indicted, and pleaded guilty in June 2019, to felony charges of third-degree rape and attempted first-degree sexual abuse and two misdemeanor charges of second-degree sexual abuse for encounters with four teenage girls that occurred during the parties at the family's home in 2016 and 2018. In November 2021, Belter was sentenced to eight years of sex offender probation. A month later, he was classified as a Level 3 sex offender. Level 3 is the most serious classification and legally indicates a 'sexual predator.' Belter was also declared a sexually violent offender. Sullo and Vacanti were originally charged with 19 combined counts of unlawfully dealing with a minor and endangering the welfare of a child in connection with the parties at their home from 2016 to 2018. In January 2020, Niagara County prosecutors leveled an additional 22 counts of endangering and unlawful dealing against Vacanti and another eight counts of the same allegations against Sullo. Long was charged with single counts of unlawfully dealing with a minor and endangering the welfare of a child. Sullo, who now resides in Florida, was not present in court for the hearing on his appeal.
San Francisco Chronicle
14 hours ago
- San Francisco Chronicle
Colleges, plagued by fraudulent ‘ghost students,' will soon have to ID aid applicants
With the growing success of criminal ghost students — bots posing as humans to steal millions of dollars in financial aid for fraudsters — California and federal regulators say they will start fighting back with an old-school technique: Making college students identify themselves. On Friday, the U.S. Department of Education announced that starting this fall, applicants for federal Pell Grants will have to show up in person or appear on a live video with an 'institutionally authorized individual' to provide 'unexpired, valid, government-issued photo identification.' The department cited California in particular, where fraudbots have siphoned off $10 million of Pell Grants and $3 million in state Cal Grant student aid since last year. California college officials voted last month to implement 'robust identity verification protocols' at their CCCapply application portal, where 2 million students a year — including many fraudbots — first enter the state's community college system. 'I think that's great,' said Kim Rich, a criminal justice instructor at L.A. Pierce College near Los Angeles. She has become an expert at identifying fraudbots and says she typically clears out three-quarters of the students — most of them bots — that enroll in her classes each term. Once they register, the bots can generate financial aid applications and disappear when the money arrives. Before any student applies to the system or enrolls in a class, Rich said, 'you verify their identity. Period. End of story. It's simple.' And yet, making sure each student is a student is anything but simple these days. That basic expectation became harder for college systems and the federal government to confirm after 2020, when the COVID-19 pandemic led to an explosion of distance-learning classes, mainly at community colleges that are open to all. Remote classes and lax verification protocols have made it far easier for criminals to impersonate students than in prior years, and then to disappear when the financial aid checks land in the mailbox. Despite the new pronouncements about a return to individual identification for state and federal financial aid, neither the U.S. of Education nor the California Community College Chancellor's Office specified how that would be achieved. Implementation difficulties became apparent at the May 21 meeting of the California Community College Board of Governors, where members debated the fraud crisis for more than three hours, ultimately agreeing to generally upgrade the CCCApply technology to try to screen out more fraudulent applications, and to generally enhance applicant identification. Love Adu, a member of the Board of Governors and an incoming junior at UC Berkeley, noted that colleges often used the identity verification software 'ID Me,' but that it excludes many kinds of students, including those who are incarcerated, undocumented, homeless or under 18. The last category includes high school students who simultaneously enroll in community college through the increasingly popular practice of dual enrollment. 'I experienced this personally and had to drive more than five hours to a college to identify myself in person because I didn't qualify for ID Me,' Adu said at the meeting. 'I had the means to do that — but I know that most students do not.' Adu urged her colleagues on the board to consider that when they eventually do hash out the specifics of how to check whether students are human. The board spent most of the meeting debating whether the state chancellor's office should be given the authority to ask the state legislature for permission to impose an application of, say, $10, on applicants in order to help authenticate them. Although the board eventually gave them that authority, students and faculty who spoke at the meeting said a fee would probably discourage many low-income students from enrolling and might not serve its intended purpose in any case. Instead, most speakers said they would prefer to figure out how to verify real students. 'I think we can all agree that we can no longer minimize the effects of this problem. Something must be done,' Eleni Gastis, president-elect of the faculty senate at Laney College in Oakland, told the board members before imploring them to 'find other strategies to mitigate fraud before we ask our students to pony up.' She is among the instructors and staff members up and down the state who are forced to spend increasing amounts of time trying to identify and disenroll fake students before they can collect financial aid. Instructors report there are so many bots that there is often no room for real students. 'It takes faculty hours of time that they could be spending supporting our students,' state Chancellor Sonya Christian said at the meeting. 'It takes our classified staff hours of time to support students that they don't have.' Statewide, security software detected and thwarted fraud in 31.4% of applications this year, up from 20% in 2023, Chris Ferguson, head of finance at the state chancellor's office, 'We needed a plan yesterday,' Gastis told the Chronicle on Friday. And when a plan is created, she said, it will have to be made clear to students and be fair to 'marginalized and fearful communities.' Following Friday's announcement from the feds, even officials at the state chancellor's office said they weren't sure what to do next. The office is 'waiting for additional guidance,' a spokesperson for the chancellor's office told the Chronicle. Even then, it might be awhile before a plan is in place. Once guidance arrives, the spokesperson said, 'we will consult with our community college stakeholders to determine what processes and procedures will be needed to comply.'
