A lawsuit against school officials who failed to report the suspected sexual abuse of a student by a teacher has been settled in West Aurora School District 129, the Daily Herald reports.
We reported the details of the case in August 2012: the band director at West Aurora High School in Chicago’s far western suburbs, was charged with the sexual assault of two female students. Steve Orland, then the band director at the high school, has since pleaded guilty to two counts of sexual abuse. Prosecutors say he had sex with two female students in the band room, a storage area, and his car, and groomed them with some 47,000 text messages.
One of the two girls, identified in the lawsuit only as Jane Doe, sued Mr Orland, the school district, the district’s Superintendent James Rydland, and Dan Bridges, who was serving as principal at the high school when the abuse occurred and now serves as the superintendent in Naperville School District 203.
Mr Orland was removed as a defendant from the lawsuit in January, but the other parties remained accused of failing to protect the plaintiff because they violated Illinois’s Abused and Neglected Children Reporting Act, here. (You can see links to similar laws in all states here.)
The details of the settlement are unavailable, as Kane County Judge Keith Brown dismissed the lawsuit with prejudice on Feb 3 and ordered the settlement sealed, the Daily Herald reported, citing court records. Dismissing a lawsuit with prejudice eliminates the possibility of appeal, and although the records are sealed, some parts of the settlement were leaked out.
“Education, not prosecution” is key, Kane County State’s Attorney Joe McMahon was quoted as saying last year when his office entered into a five-year deferred prosecution agreement with District 129. The district agreed to provide training about their mandated reporting duties under Illinois law in exchange for Mr McMahon’s office not prosecuting about 10 school employees who didn’t perform those duties.
“Had mistakes not been made” by school officials, the girl’s attorney said, “my client wouldn’t be in counseling right now.”
West Aurora School District 129 includes North Aurora and portions of Aurora, Montgomery, and Sugar Grove. It serves more than 12,500 students in 10 elementary schools, four middle schools, one high school, one child development center, and one special-education facility.
The school board recently concluded a search for a superintendent to replace Mr Rydland, announcing today that Jeffrey Craig, now a superintendent in Truro, Iowa, near Des Moines, who had served as principal at Oswego East High School from 2008 to 2013, would take over July 1.
Changes to Illinois’s Abused and Neglected Child Reporting Act
A new law in Illinois, which takes effect on July 1, followed from this case. The new law requires all school district personnel to receive training in Illinois’s mandatory reporting laws within a year of being hired and every five years thereafter.
For more information about reporting child abuse in Illinois, we refer you to the website for the Department of Children and Family Services, here. Their number, for reporting suspected abuse, is 1-800-25-ABUSE.
