Teachers Cleared of Heroin in Fallsburg NY

Last month we reported here on SBSB how 6 teachers and an aide in Fallsburg NY were accused of being heroin users while on school time.

On two separate occasions heroin was found in the teachers rest room at the Benjamin Cosor Elementary School. The teachers and aide were accused because the video surveillance equipment set up after the first discovery of the heroin revealed these 7 using using the rest room at the approximate time when it was speculated the heroin was being used in the bathroom.

These teachers and the aide were vilified across the nation in some of the most wing nut, bat s*** crazy places one can imagine. Worse, they were convicted, locked up, and the key thrown away in the very community they serve so honorably.

The police chief of Fallsburg NY, Simmie Williams proclaimed;

"If you got nothing to hide, give me some urine,"

Of course Chief Williams duty to uphold the laws and the Constitution of the United States means diddly as long as he can get pissed on.

Parents of the school and school district while rightly concerned, wanted to be judge, jury and prosecutor and deemed that the teachers were hiding behind the union and should either be fired or suspended without pay. But two interesting things happened along the way, only one of which was reported somewhat en masse and another not so en masse.

As reported here in February, a school contracted employee, an occupational therapist, was also amongst the accused. He submitted to a urine test and it came back negative. Even though we reported on these pages that a urine test for heroin can only come back positive within 2 days after suspected usage.

But last week, according to the Times Herald Record of March 27, the school resource officer, Martin Gonzalez of the Fallsburg PD was quietly removed from the school due to a lack of trust among the staff at the school.

Now, one must ask themselves, how did it come to be that Officer Gonzalez found the heroin both times? What are the chances of this happening? Did he suggest the video surveillance and if so did he obtain a warrant for the video surveillance?

But the investigation is getting higgedly piggedly. The Times Herald Record reported today that all the teachers have been tested, not by giving Chief Williams some pee-pee, but by giving them a piece of their hair. And.....? All tests came back negative.

But what about the occupational therapist? Has he given a sample of his hair? If he hasn't why not? Is he a friend of Officer Martinez? Does he have friends in the Sullivan County District Attorney's Office? Who is he? What is his name? Why so fast to accuse the teachers but not this occupational therapist?

But it seems the teachers have been exonerated and no one, not the Fallsburg Police Department, the District Attorney's office, nor the Fallsburg Central School District is reaching out to the teachers and apologizing. What gives?

These staff members are marked. As Peter Duncan the school aide said before yesterday's school board meeting;

"I'm the one who was told on social media that I deserve a bullet in my head; I'm the one who was told that I needed to be hung and beaten; I'm the one who was told I should lose my job. The district has not done their part to clear our names."

Well, when is the school board coming up with a mea culpa? 

This is not about advocating or condoning drug use or hiding behind the cloak of union protection, but rather about due process that was not afforded these staff members. This is why unions are needed more and more in education. This is why due process is so important to teachers. This country has become so shrill and alarmist to any perceived misdeed by teachers the last ten years that people have more empathy for a serial killer and demand that the killer gets due process but want teachers tried and convicted before any facts are in or before any prosecution even starts.

We here at SBSB demand that a special prosecutor be named to look into what happened at the Benjamin Cosor Elementary School immediately and for the occupational therapist to be named and his hair samples be given just as fast.

We are all innocent till proven guilty, but it seems that this does not mean that teachers are anymore.

Something stinks in Fallsburg really bad.