L.A. school closes amid teacher sex abuse probe

[maddezmom]

AP) LOS ANGELES - The superintendent of schools is meeting with worried parents and classes are canceled for two days at a Southern California elementary school where two teachers are suspected of lewd acts with young students, officials said.


Los Angeles Unified School District Superintendent John Deasy will hold the meeting at 6 p.m. Monday at a high school near Miramonte Elementary, the school that has brought national attention to the country's second-largest school district, with allegations of teachers engaging in sexual misconduct with students as young as six.


School officials have canceled classes at the school on Tuesday and Wednesday, district spokeswoman Monica Carazo said. The closure is related to the investigation and aftermath of the arrested teachers, but Carazo was not certain what would be happening on campus, or whether faculty and staff would be there.


Last week teacher Mark Berndt, 61, who worked at the school for 32 years, was charged with committing lewd acts on 23 children, ages 6 to 10, between 2005 and 2010.

more:http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-201_162-57371798/l.a-school-closes-amid-teacher-sex-abuse-probe/

[frazzled]

1. Good heavens

How could this have gone on for so long?

Details at one of the links in the OP link. Shocking:

Using a cheap camera, Berndt is suspected of snapping nearly 400 photographs of Miramonte students, some with a giant Madagascar cockroach from a classroom terrarium on their faces.

Others were blindfolded or had clear tape over their mouths, and some were shown with a spoonful of milky liquid placed near their lips, sheriff's Sgt. Dan Scott said.

The photo sessions were treated as a game and some children were given sperm-laced cookies to eat as treats, Scott said. Berndt didn't sell or share the photographs but did give copies to some children, Scott said. ...

The investigation began in the fall of 2010 when a film processor became suspicious about the photographs and turned them over to Redondo Beach police, who on Dec. 2, 2010, handed them over to the Sheriff's Department, Scott said. ...

An investigator then found a blue spoon apparently hidden in a trash can that appeared to be the one seen in the photographs, but it took months before analysis determined there was semen on the spoon and more time before DNA testing matched it to Berndt, authorities said.

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-201_162-57370260/report-l.a-teacher-complaints-go-back-to-1990/?tag=contentMain;contentBody

[maddezmom]

2. it's unbelievable

and I have a feeling there are going to be more victims.

[Snake Alchemist]

3. Covering for their own?

You have to think that others must have known.

[boppers]

7. Counselors were told.

The children were then told to stop making stories up.

[Snake Alchemist]

8. that gives me cold child. nt

[Pisces]

4. This is disgusting. Of course this is in a poor neighborhood.

[Pisces]

5. These pieces of shit get to keep their benefits even if they get fired. $4000 per month!!! This is a

a travesty and a hole in the system. They should lose all benefits.

[obamanut2012]

9. They will be imprisoned, not just fired

They won't be getting any pension.

[msanthrope]

6. Terrible. I hope Deasy cleans house. nt