03-05-2025
A Boise teacher faced child porn allegations. Parents filed a $50M tort claim
Parents of a Valley View Elementary School student have filed a $50 million tort claim against the Boise School District after a special education paraprofessional was accused of producing pornography of their child.
The elementary school employee, Gavin Snow, committed suicide in January after Boise Police Department officers attempted to arrest him on suspicion of child sexual abuse and exploitation crimes. He was 22.
Police began investigating Snow after the Boise School District contacted them over allegations that he was producing child porn, according to a news release from law enforcement. Officers spoke to Snow on Jan. 7 and seized his electronic devices. Once they received a search warrant, officers said they found evidence of child exploitation and the production of child sexual abuse materials.
Snow was placed on administrative leave the next day. Officers then on Jan. 10 attempted to arrest Snow at his home off of Mountain View Drive in Boise, according to a police report obtained by the Idaho Statesman through a public records request. He attempted to flee through his backyard, and when an officer asked him to stop, he cut his own throat with a large kitchen knife, police said.
The parents are being represented by Boise-based attorney Jeffrey McKinnie, who filed the claim in mid-April. Tort claims are precursors to lawsuits filed against government agencies, but they don't always mean someone will sue.
The claim was first reported by Idaho Education News. The school district provided the Statesman with a copy of the claim upon request Friday evening, but it declined to comment and directed the Statesman to prior statements.
'This claim involved negligent, reckless, willful, deliberate, intentional, deliberately indifferent, wanton, and grossly negligent conduct committed by agents and employees of Valley View Elementary School and the Boise School District,' McKinnie wrote in the four-page legal document.
Snow 'was involved in multiple instances of inappropriate behavior with more than one student in the bathroom and sensory room at Valley View,' according to the Boise School District, which has since implemented changes for special-education staff, the result of an outside investigation.
The parents accused Valley View, along with the school district, of failing to have the proper policies and procedures in effect to protect its special needs students, 'including those most vulnerable.'
'There were gaps in policies and procedures as to special education students, including, without limitation, allowance of cell phones in bathroom facilities, lack of appropriate toileting procedures including as to the lack of a two-adult staff member supervision, requirement, a lack of training on possible indicators of child abuse as to special needs students, and a lack of line-of-sight into certain rooms,' according to the complaint.
Administrators from the Boise School District and Valley View met with parents and guardians in early April to go over the findings of an investigation conducted by Holinka Law P.C. Reporters were barred from attending, but the district sent out a summary of the investigation the next day.
Many of the changes implemented at Valley View address issues raised by the tort claim. Staff members are prohibited from bringing cellphones into the bathrooms while toileting or diapering students, the Statesman previously reported. They also aren't allowed to be left alone with students in the sensory room or during bathroom procedures.
'We deeply regret what happened to the children at Valley View Elementary and the damage done to the trust our public places in us every day,' the district wrote in a news release last month. 'We recognize that no words can undo the trauma experienced by students and families, but we hope that our actions — both in the immediate aftermath and through long-term reforms — demonstrate how seriously we take this violation to our students.'
