Mingo teachers to be reassigned in light of sexual assault allegations

Mingo County school officials have agreed to reassign administrators and teachers who allegedly threatened disciplinary action against girls who reported being sexually abused or assaulted by male classmates, Attorney General Patrick Morrisey reports.

Morrisey said the district  agreed to the changes stipulated in Senior Status Judge John L. Cumming's preliminary injunction, including immediate assignment of a "designated professional" from outside Burch Middle School to supervise students and staff for the remainder of the school year.

The order states that the Mingo County Board of Education "has taken non-disciplinary personnel action to place certain employees on leave during the investigation, while others have left the school for 'non-related reasons.'”

It also requires school officials to return one of the girls who had been forced to switch classes to her age-appropriate class, and stipulates that the girls "will be protected from having to face those who are accused of abusing them at school," Morrisey said.

The order prohibits all of the defendants from having direct or indirect contact with any of the girls or their families, and specifies that if the school determines that discipline is required, "that discipline must be performed by some other administrator or employee who is not named as a defendant," Morrisey said.

The order also requires the school district to report any and all reports, allegations, or complaints of sexual abuse and sexual assault that have been made during the past five years at Burch Middle School to the Attorney General’s Office and West Virginia State Police, and that all future reports of suspected child abuse and neglect be reported to the Department of Health and Human Resources, and if needed, the State Police.

Morrisey said Cumming's order opens the door to a full and complete investigation into the alleged sexual abuse at the school.

It also suggested one of the alleged perpetrators is a relative of an employee of the Board of Education “who actively participated" in the school's internal response to the allegations, and that school administrators actively downplayed the seriousness of the allegations to the parents of the girls, failed to return calls or supply them with copies of their child's initial statement to school personnel and denied troopers investigating the allegations access to students in school.