I agree. Isn't that how the witch trials started? YOung girls telling tales.

While I agree, kids are stupid. It's the school district's responsibility to see through that stupidity. I'm sure if the kids were still in the school system, something would happen. It may only be a slap on the wrist, but it would certainly follow them until they graduated high school, and might show up on college applications.

In February, a jury agreed that he had been deprived of due process and awarded him damages of $1.1 million from the school district and just over $52,000 from the human resources employee, Kay Cunningham, who no longer works for the school district.

Time to sue the parents both him and the school district!!!!!

Yeah boomer, it's called home schooling and is probably the worse possible idea if you want your kids to be able to deal with human beings at some point in their lives. You want to create a generation of pod people who are scared to leave their homes. Grand idea.

Scott,
Don't you like the idea of 0% social interaction?

It's not like they need to learn how to live in a social environment, what with all the bullying going on...(sarcasm)

The school district handled this poorly, but how about he sue said students? In this day and age, school districts have no choice but to investigate this stuff closely. It's far less damning to find out students are lying than to not investigate allegations of sexual assault/molestion/etc.

I hope these students are punished harshly, and I don't mean grounding.

I knew a home schooled girl in college. We were friends. She did get a better education, but upon going to community college she had a breakdown and had to leave. Her family worked on getting her prepared for living on her own then tried college again, with better luck.

She told me her parents learned that home schooled kids were at greater risk of exploitation by peers due to naivety. They were part of New York state homeschool group or association. Meeting that charming guy for the first time has risks because they have not experienced nor heard other stories of girls getting used or abused by them. People are selfish, she stated in her first college try her peers tried making her buy them food or snacks all the time simply because she didn't know how to say no.

I am all for homeschooling but the parents need to better prepare their kids for the outside world. Unless they work with teenagers around their kids age all the time, they probably have no idea what teens can do to each other.

Human Resources at any place tends to be overly cautious and works to get rid of the employee. Hopefully this will be the start of a new trend. Rather than fire the employee or 'encourage' him to leave, that HR departments across the nation will start worrying about being sued from the other end as well.

Too many innocent people have lost their jobs through false accusations that were mishandled by incompetent management.

He still can sue the brats; he may even have the option of pressing legal charges (libel and slander).

In schools today, kids think they can get away with anything they want and are immune to any type of consequences.

Rather than pay dollars, the little brats that all made the allegations should be spanked publicly at school. Perhaps that would serve to educate others as to what can happen when you make serious allegations against someone.

This all started when the government got into family regulation years ago, when children were allowed to call the police on their parents, I knew then that this was a downhill slide into this kind of stuff. Children can be very vindictive. Yea, I Know there are some children that need protection from parents, But this is the unintended consequences.

This is why I think people who make false accusations of sex crimes should go to jail for as long as the accused would have gone. Every male teacher I had in High School always insisted that the door stay open when they were alone with one or two students, and would sometimes make the girls leave if he was going to be alone with them. One false accusation from a vindictive girl can destroy a man's life.

Maybe a few years in juvy will teach them to not try to destroy someones life out of spite.

Suing the parents won't accomplish anything.

I would basically make the kids (depending on their age) have to pay him restitution (ad they get jobs..something in the range of $10-$25k over 10 years) and also do a public service announcement on what they did and how it could ruin someone's life.

Time to sue the parents both him and the school district!!!!!

As I like to say, 'Fun to think about!', but that's about it. First, this was more than six years ago now, so the odds are very good that the statute of limitations has expired. In most cases, one has two years to bring civil suits. Secondly, parents are protected in most states from liability beyond a certain amount for the actions of their minor children. The amount varies, but usually is several thousand dollars. A teenage son or daughter may go cause some sort of traffic wreck that results in, say, over a hundred thousand dollars of damage. The injured party had better have insurance, because the teenager will have effectively no liability as they are a minor and the parents of the teenager can be on the hook for maybe $2000 or so, again, depending upon the laws of the particular state.

He still can sue the brats; he may even have the option of pressing legal charges (libel and slander).

Again, he never could sue 'the brats' directly as they would have been twelve years old at the time. You cannot sue a minor! You can sue their parents, but he would have had to have done so, most likely, by 2008 and the most he could recover from them would have been a few grand. This is assuming that they had assets worth that much they could reasonably liquidate (no court would force someone to sell their home or personal vehicle to satisfy a $2000 judgement in a case such as this) and as the parent is not being held responsible for something that they, themselves, did with malicious intent (even if their child may have), such a judgement would most likely be dismissed by bankruptcy if it really came down to it.

Libel and slander are very difficult to effectively make a case for in court under normal circumstances, and like any suit against the parents of the children who did this, it would not be a good idea to pursue it.

A settlement for $680,000 from the school district really is about as good as it gets in cases such as this.

In schools today, kids think they can get away with anything they want and are immune to any type of consequences.

Unfortunately, they don't think it, they know it, and act accordingly.

Sounds like a public school district, so aren't the taxpayers paying the bill? How does that make the school board less likely to do the same thing in the future (especially because the lawsuit from parents could be equally large if a pedophile teacher was kept on board too long)? Indeed, it does sound like this was never properly investigated, and I think the families responsible for making the claims should pay for the outcome. I can't believe a simple case like this has people questioning the wisdom of public schools, working mothers, and child protective services. What cult are you all from? The answer to lying brats is some sort of legal and financial penalty for the false reports, not a return to the Stone Age.

One really fed up boomer, is that the dumbest thing you could think to say... if so, congrats, because is was really, really dumb.

Why investigate the students when the School Administration won't do anything about them? (Sarcasm) My wife is a middle school teacher and 2 years ago she literally watched as 2 female students were whispering to each other and watched as one student stood up pulled her shirt down enough to show what little cleavage she had (Middle School Remember) and went up to ask the male teacher a question. The teacher saw what she was doing ahead of time and did not play her game by looking at her. He talked to her through a book. Both girls went ahead and reported him for looking at them in an uncomfortable manner. My Wife went to the principle and the School administration to back him up 100%. They still transferred him to another school during Christmas break and at the end of the school year they did not renew his contract (No tenure yet). Since they transferred him there was nothing the union could do about it. Since he didn't have tenure yet they couldn't force the school district to offer him a job. The only bright spot in this entire situation is that when the kids at school found out what they did not a single kid would talk to them for the rest of the year, and I mean nobody would talk to them. One of the kids mother was the president of the PTA and other parents demanded that she step down. None of the teachers would support anything the PTA proposed until she did. Also one of the girls was a Girl Scout and when she brought her packet to school to sell cookies not a single Teacher, Secretary, or Janitor bought a single box of cookies from her. You may think this is a little extreme for Teachers to go after students but this was not directed at the students, this was directed at the parents. They were told about another teacher witnessing what they were doing and even that nobody else in the teachers classroom saw him do anything like this. The parents kept pushing and threatening to sue if they did not fire him immediately, rather then think that maybe their little angels could never do something like that. I wish the guy in this article would sue the parents, it would teach them a lesson. Teachers are always getting a bad wrap. Do you know of any other job where you are expected to constantly update your skills on your own dime (No compensations for classes), you're expected to provide supplies for kids that forget to bring them to class, and if you work summer school you get no break or vacation. God forbid that you come in some day and a principle has a bad day and decides to not renew your contract because you don't fit into their social circles.

Just as I view child predators as some of the worst types of criminals, so too I view those falsely accused of such a crime as among the most unfortunate of victims.

Allegations of child abuse, even if later termed false, have a tendancy to stick to one's public image forever.

I'd much rather be accused of robbing a liquor store.

This was a case a bunch of vindictive little girls ruining a man's life just because he did not give their friend a good grade. Their needs to be consequences for these kids. There is no reason that the school district or their insurance company should get stuck footing the entire bill while these little brats and the parents that raised them walk away scot free. The school district bears some responsibility because of the actions of their HR department and the failure to investigate fully before forcing this guy to resign, but there also need to be consequences for the ones who really caused this, the group of teenage girls with a grudge. Maybe if we start holding the parents responsible when their little darlings pull this kind of crap, the parents will start paying a little more attention to how they are raising their kids. This is one case where the lie was found out, but there have been many more cases where it has not. Many male teachers have had their lives destroyed by vindictive little girls who did not get the grade they wanted. Society has become so conditioned to automatically believe these kids that these men are convicted without even the smallest shred of evidence. All it takes is the unsupported allegations of one spoiled little brat and the guy's life is over. People completely underestimate the vindictiveness of children and are far too quick to believe them when they make accusations like this. I fully understand the seriousness of the problem of child abuse and recognize that there are teachers out there that abuse their positions to prey on kids. However, that does not mean that every accusation that comes out of a kid's mouth is the truth. We need to get back to idea that these teachers are innocent until proven guilty, and the word of a group of teenage girls who are all friends is certainly not proof in my book.

D, it used to be the school system's responsibility and RIGHT to punish the little turds for lying and defaming. It still should be but PC crap has let kids become monsters by getting away with stuff like this.

Hmmm, I'm thinking I saw this movie once, only it was high school girls, and it was Denise Richards and Neve Campbell.

Then Matt Dillon won the lawsuit and ran off with the students and the money!

I wonder if he ever collected the $52k from Kay.

ScottW714

Yeah boomer, it's called home schooling and is probably the worse possible idea if you want your kids to be able to deal with human beings at some point in their lives. You want to create a generation of pod people who are scared to leave their homes. Grand idea.

Sounds like they are doing "really well" in the public school system. Some people don't deserve the efoorts wasted on them.

100% agree - the parents of the brats should have to pay restitution. So long as parents are held responsible for their little balls of snots - they'll keep on breeding and expect everyone else to raise their child and pay for all their child's expenses.

ScottW714

Yeah boomer, it's called home schooling and is probably the worse possible idea if you want your kids to be able to deal with human beings at some point in their lives. You want to create a generation of pod people who are scared to leave their homes. Grand idea.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Scott, if I had school aged kids today I would home school them, why?

1. Bullying- My son was bullied in school, we took care of it by having him learn martial arts - he did - the next time he was attacked he kicked the shyt out of the SOB - today it would have been a different outcome with the victim taking the punishment.

2. With 30 plus kids to one teacher no one can learn anything as the teacher is a baby sitter not a teacher

3. Too many teachers should not even be in the craft, as they are not cut out to be good teachers

4. With society in the condition it is today I am not at all certain I would want my children to "interact" with the general public - only those I know will not hurt them.

5. We already have a generation of pod people, how many "secure communities" do we have where people live behind walls and gates not only in the development but around their own homes as well. Pod people are already here - go to almost any newer subdivision in this country.

6. To be blunt the old model of teaching is simply too expensive and will become increasingly out of rich as our wages continue to fall into line with that of China and other third world countries.

Based on personal experience with the exception of the final exams I earned two doctorate degrees Electronic Engineering and Physics home studying and I suppose you might be correct I do not interact well with fools but a major defense contractor still has me under contract 5 years after I retired for my expertise. So don't condemn what you know little about.

rufn serious

One really fed up boomer, is that the dumbest thing you could think to say... if so, congrats, because is was really, really dumb.

---------------------------------------------------

Yep It was so dumb I got me two Doctorate degrees doing this very thing and for years was making a really good living as a PHD Physics, and Electronics with one of my products in your television set. so Yep I am dumb (like a fox) not someone who has nothing to add to society like so many of you folks on the Vine.

These so called little girls should get what they were trying to force on this man and be registered sex offenders when they become adults...let them live with that for the rest of their life and eventually these false accusations would at least slow down and make people think twice about making.

That's the problem with some rape and molestation claims. Vindictive little sluts trying to get even.

If not monetary restitution, then at least have the kids required to perform some form of community service, inside or outside the school, say to the tune of 500 hours or so. Kid's learn from TV and the Internet that it's very easy to "get back" at a teacher or other adult authority figure by screaming 'inappropriate behavior/sexual behavior' toward them. They know that generally the teacher/authority figure will be crucified to protect the 'innocent youth'. You have to wonder how many of these stories you hear now of teachers' inappropriate conduct with students is drummed up (I ask why there are so many people suddenly interested in sex with young kids). You don't often hear the stories of the people that were found not guilty of this and the children were actually lying, so this is a good story. But there has to be something to make the kids understand that there are repercussions if you're found to be lying to hurt others with these accusations.

the TiGor

He still can sue the brats; he may even have the option of pressing legal charges (libel and slander).

Again, he never could sue 'the brats' directly as they would have been twelve years old at the time. You cannot sue a minor!

People can sue anyone they want, anytime they want. Even if these brats were minors at the time, they still can be sued. It will cost them much-buckos for it just to defend themselves. And they were then, and still are, brats. No need to put it in quotations as if it wasn't true. If I were the teacher, I'd spend the rest of my life making their lives miserable. People who make false accusations, even when they're 12, need to be punished to the point where they think they're lives...well, you know what I'm saying. It can be used as an educational tool to show other 12-year-old brats never to do something like this unless they want to end up in a story where a line states: "...she pointed the gun to her head..." No big loss. Not even a small one.

Maybe where you live, Jerry. But in most places, a twelve year old does not have the legal capacity to be a defendant.

Also, YOU cannot sue, unless you're an attorney. THEY can sue anyone, anytime, and some of them are very good at doing that, whether anyone hires them to do so or not. This is where most of the frivolous lawsuits come from. It's a little bit of work for the attorney, but it generally costs them nothing but their time and overhead expenses to file a lawsuit. If you have to hire an attorney to do anything for you, you are probably painfully aware that they charge clients for almost everything unless they're generous enough to offer free initial consultations or to do their work on contingency or else pro bono.

An attorney who is looking for someone to sue probably isn't a very good attorney. He (or she) is also likely to take anything that comes their way, but there's absolutely no guarantee they'll prevail for their client, either. Being broke makes people do some very bizarre things! A good attorney with an excellent track record is a busy professional who isn't going to waste their valuable time on suits without merit, suits unlikely to resolve to satisfaction, or suits where any judgement is unlikely to be collected.

Any attorney who would attempt to sue a minor directly is a lawyer one should run from - FAST! Suing the parents of a minor, maybe, but if the statue of limitations has passed and it doesn't look too promising that a judgement would be satisfied (as in, parents living at or below the poverty line), any attorney who knows their profession well isn't going to be interested.

People seem to always automatically assume that such molestation-type charges are true, even contrary to evidence, and therein lies the source of such witch-hunts, as demonstrated by the school board.

Even though the students are "only children", the charges they conjured up result in very adult consequences. Their parents should be made to pay for the misdeeds of their children; this is the only reliable way to demonstrate to these students the seriousness of their actions and that those actions have real-world consequences.

those girls that made these false accusations are certain to be nonproductive sluts their whole lives, never getting any further in life than some idiot sap takes them. i'm sure non of them are in any real trouble for the pain they caused this man, which is really sickening ...

I am all for homeschooling but the parents need to better prepare their kids for the outside world. Unless they work with teenagers around their kids age all the time, they probably have no idea what teens can do to each other.

How about the parents of the other kids teach their kids to be decent people and not take advantage of others

I think dslodge has a very good idea- put the lying little bastards on the sex offender list. They REALLY do belong there since they used a lie about sex to cause someone uncounted griefs and the ruination of their reputation in their community. It seems to me that that is a bigger offense than being caught diddling a willing and cooperative 17 yr old- plus, those kids are/were sexual predators in their own right by misusing charges of sexual misconduct for petty revenge and destroying that teacher's life.

By the way, that diddled 17 yr old I mentioned comes from a case that happened locally (for me) back in the 60s or 70s. A local catholic priest and a 17 yr old girl fell in love and were found out and the priest was forced to leave his calling amid much hullaballoo. A year later the 17 yr old girl was 18 and she and the former priest were married, which once again scandalized many in my community. Notice that I didn't say he "abused" her, but that they fell in love. Many never stopped criticizing him unmercifully, but he and the young lady remained happily married until his death decades later. In the end, the church lost an excellent and caring priest & the community lost an excellent spiritual shepherd. No, he didn't go to jail for his "offense" as her age was over 16 yrs old. The priest didn't prey on children and wasn't a pedophile. He simply fell in love with a 17 yr old girl with whom he had much contact due to her volunteer work within the parish, and she with him.

The case with this teacher reads like a South Park episode where the kids all have their parents jailed as abusers by falsely accusing them of "bad touching". With no investigation the parents are all sentenced to jail and are forced to undergo counseling (read brainwashing) for their"crime". Of course, it was hilarious. South Park always is. But what that lie-ing (sic), vindictive, lazy, little ignoramus and her friends did was nothing to laugh at, nor was the school's simply accepting their claim as truth with no investigation. Even the Salem "witches" had an investigation and trial, such as they were in that age. I have always thought of this national hysteria over pedophilia as nothing more than a modern witch hunt. People's reputations and lives are destroyed even when an accusation is PROVEN to be false. Nowadays an adult cannot even say "good morning" or "hi" to a minor as they pass each other on the sidewalk without being regarded as some sort of predator. Even with adults it has become that way! I've experienced it myself many times. I was taught that it was impolite to pass someone on the street without acknowledging them, but now all is fear and mistrust, continually hyped in the news and in regular TV programming. Too bad for us.....and it is only getting worse.

It is difficult enough; in todays culture of children who can get away with anything attitudes, to be a school teacher. Then to be falsely accused of something is out and out mean. The children need to be punished by a huge amount of community service of the teacher's choice.

It's really sad when the evil, hurtful intentions of a few low-class b*tches change's a man's life, a man who was actually there to help and educate. It takes a lot of cold-heartedness, lack of conscience and morals, and selfishness to do what they did. That's gonna be some bad karma...

I agree with you. My daughter was well-endowed by the time she was in the 6th grade. She came to us with claims that her teacher was ogling her and getting uncomfortably close during class. We had a meeting with the principal, the district's counselor, and the teacher. We were given the opportunity to explain what our daughter claimed and the teacher was given the same opportunity. After hearing the teacher out, my husband and I came to the conclusion that she was misinterpreting his actions. And that was the end of it. Children that age (just entering puberty) don't know what constitutes a sexual leer or just a passing glance checking on all of the students to see that they are doing their work and not goofing off.

this was not a case of them misinterpreting his actions, they were trying to hurt him because there friend was doing poorly in the class. The designation of bitch fits in this context.

Vivid imaginations? A bunch of cruel and vindictive young girls ruining a man's career and life, and you call it a vivid imagination? The parents should lose their home as a deterrent to other people to raise their children properly. if they auctioned off these girls' parents' homes, it might make a dent in his losses instead of always putting the burden on the schools and school districts' insurance companies. This wasn't imagination; it was pure nastiness. Parents make excuse for their little darlings, and the children just take advantage of it. They need to prosecute them according to the crimes they commit, not their age. When charges are brought against an adult, somebody needs to sit down with the children and the children's parents and explain to them the seriousness of the accusation and the consequences of the charge if it turns out to be false. The kids and the parents should be given 48 hours to discuss it before charges are filed. If the parents are willing to risk responsibility for the child falsely accusing an adult after the discussion, then the charge should go forward. if not, then it should be dropped. I'm sorry to say that in the case of a parent that is not willing to get involved, then someone else must step forward in their stead, a teacher or counselor.

Come on, they ARE children and humans. Humans make mistakes, particularly children.

I wont feel sorry for these girls if they get raped now. Maybe it'll teach them how a real victim feels.

MrBurns, i think you said this out of anger and don't really mean it. But look at all the cries for retribution in this comment thread or any other. These girls did this trying to get revenge for a perceived wrong.

I'm not denying their actions are VERY serious, as they detract from the pleas of REAL victims. Consequences are about helping people make better choices in the future and helping them understand the pain they caused. We need to get over this revenge attitude where "justice" is about the "evil" people PAYING, HARDER and FASTER.

Im serious Andrew, they used rape as a tool to try to get what they want. Screwing over an innocent, and women who have actually been raped and wont be believed because of monsters like them. I dont care if it happens to them. I feel the same way about them as a pedophile getting raped in prison.

Actually it says 'No longer with the school' not that she lost the job. She may have quit or got reassigned. Maybe even as a reward for her role in this. I hope she learns a lesson that twisting the truth will come back to bite you in this day and age.

Yeah, she likely thought she would get an "atta-girl" and a pat on the a$$ for being so vigilant. Just like the situation where neighbors can "turn in" neighbors they don't like for any imaginary crime and have the cops tear up their house.

A good paddling with a old fashion "board of education" is in order. SWAT!!!! In front of the whole school. First the kid . Then the parents.

& tie their little tubes!

I agree..there will always be a lingering suspicion..

We have been told over and over again, especially all the false "satanic ritual phenomenon" going all the way back to the '80's that "kids don't lie about this." Well, they do. Remember, the one making the accusation is the one who bears the burden of proof. Did Sandusky's accusers bear the burden of proof? Yes, they did, and they proved it. Now that evil piece of feces will spend the rest of his life in prison.

People who make these false accusations should go to jail for no less than 5 years. Destroying the lives of innocents, and casting doubts on actual victims. Bottom sucking scum.

And, people wonder why we have so few male teachers as role models for students...they get the most scrutiny and are quickly let go if even a whiff of anything bad happened...and, just why aren't these students punished...this is not only pure evil, it is slander...the teacher should be able to sue them AND their records should reflect what they did...especially if they apply to college...as well as their future place of employment...let the world know how they lied to get someone fired

I've been in the Charlotte/Mecklenburg County area for 12 years, and I'm very glad my children didn't go to school here. Friends here with school-age children are all sending them to private schools, even at considerable expense and distance.

This teacher had only two problems: i) he's white, and ii) he's male. And we see what that got him for internal support and an impartial investigation. If anyone thinks this episode is preoccupying the CharMeck BOE or school administration, you'd be mistaken. They're too busy raising taxes, finding fault and pointing fingers (follow the theme here??) for their abysmal education system.

I'm leaving for the west coast in a month. For good, and for reasons just like this.

Unfortunately, you're STILL taking a chance if you teach high school. Yes, we need to have private conversations with students--I do mine in the hall, right in front of one of the security cameras--but there's always the risk that a kid will make up a story about what you said to him/her. Probably won't get you fired, but can still cause a lot of headaches.

A few years of Juvy would be reasonable I'd say.

EXPEL those little b!tches!

It's not males, at my son's school a male student claimed to have had sex with a female teacher. She ended up killing herself over the public reaction to the false claim. Yes it came out after her death that it was a false claim, but the damage was done and no punishment for the accuser.

I have to agree. While I'm not a fan of the bonanza of a pay day this guy is getting off the school and tax payers expense, the little brats that did this should be made to pay for their actions. I'm tired of teens thinking because they aren't 'adults' yet, they can get away with everything. It's not just male teachers though, there are plenty of female teachers who get falsely accused of harassment and inappropriate touching as well. Until these kids get punished for their actions, and the parents too in my opinion, this crap will continue.

It wouldn't hurt the Nation one single bit to have a law that would inflict on a false accuser, major or minor, the same punishment that would have been meted out to their victim. It also wouldn't hurt to have a major revision and have one single standard for the whole country. Also, an accused person should have the right to demand that their accuser undergo a polygraph examination like they might have to. Then information is gained about who is lie-ing (sic) and just what they're lie-ing about. If a false accusation results in the suicide of the accused, then the accuser should face charges of pre-meditated homicide.

I can't believe what parents let slide in the behavior of their kids nowadays. I remember my brother being caught stealing cars for joyrides when he was 16 or 17. My father punched him so hard it broke his nose. His head hit the wall hard enough to make a skull sized hole in it, and then Dad gave him hell for bleeding all over the new carpet. My brother faced CONSEQUENCES FOR HIS ACTIONS- personal AND legal consequences. He never stole another car after that- lesson learned. My father was a WW II veteran and he didn't muck about or dither around when it came to discipline. The only time he would ignore law breaking was if we were caught by the cops drinking underage. He regarded that as "boys will be boys" unless we did something seriously stupid- like stealing cars for joyrides. He wanted to raise young men and not pantywaists. Out of 8 kids, 7 served in the armed forces At one point 5 of us were in at the same time in the various Services. My father could be tough, but he raised decent people with a healthy respect for the consequences of their actions, and we've done the same for our own kids. Every time I read about lame parents and their lamer kids I thank my lucky stars.

Isn't that terrible? A few turds lie about it then we start doubting the majority of kids that actually need help. I was not aware people use to think "kids never lie about things of importance." I think as long as I've know my brother and sister they were lying as early as age 5.

A pathological or compulsive liar is someone who can't help themselves, who just gets pleasure out of making up outlandish tales and seeing you swallow their story. They make up lies where they derive no actual benefit from telling the lie except the feeling of success of getting away with it. So if someone tells you a story that doesn't quite ring true, don't believe it just because you can't think of any reason why the teller would make up a story like that. That's what they are counting on. It's also a lesson that you shouldn't repeat things people tell you. Until you've encountered a pathological liar, you would never guess anybody could lie to you and believe their own lie as they are speaking it. Just hope none of your children turn out that way. I don't think there is a cure.

I suspect that stories about inappropriate behavior the kids are now exposed to in movies, on TV, and via the Internet give them more ideas of how to get back at people they don't like. Think about it: How many stories have you read/seen over the last 20 years involving inappropriate sexual behavior between adults and children. What generally happens to the adult? If a kid wants to be vindictive against an adult, there are a lot of ideas floating around out there to give them ideas of what they can do that will crucify the adult. They don't have the capability to understand how their actions can actually destroy the adult through job loss, identification as a sexual predator, loss of family, inability to find future employment, and too often depression and suicide.

I agree. When kids misbehave like this they need to serve community service at a bare minimum and apologize to the teacher. My son was saying something ugly as students got off the bus. The bus driver informed my husband. My son got appropriate discipline and phoned the bus driver and apologized and apologized to the students. He claimed an other student told him to say it. My reply was well you don't do what some kid tells you! He was six and the other kid was 8. I see where it started but he has to take responsibility for what comes out of his mouth. "He made me do it" won't keep him out of jail as an adult.

It is refreshing to read most of the comments in this thread. I wonder where you people are on other threads where the teacher (either gender) is merely accused of some sexual act with a student (even if the student is at least 18) and everyone wants to throw the teacher under the bus (being nice).

I don't think most people have a clue, nor really care, about what really goes on. I get the impression that everyone thinks teachers are always the perpetrators, and even if they are not, they should know better. Ok, perhaps. But there's plenty of times, such as here, where it is a mere ALLEGATION.

People, when these stories come out, you need to always ask yourselves; who is benefitting from this? Did the complaint come from a parent? Or a student with low grades? Or someone else? As time goes by it seems that society is just getting more and more screwed up.

In this case the teacher moved to the other side of the country. Sadly, something like this does follow you.

It is hard for me to understand why so many dedicated people even get into teaching. The risks are extremely high and the pay is not commensurate with the long hours and the potential for being destroyed. You all have my utmost respect.

From another teacher--thanks for saying that, Jerry.

I left teaching 3 years ago after being harassed out. It was a big sport to misbehave and then accuse me of something. I knew some of the kids would be bragging on twitter and it took just 15 minutes to find this.....

I'd like to find someone who might help me make a stand against this so it does not continue.

While the specifics are not the same, the Salem Witch Trials and this kind of "trial" are very similar. Even sadder, the ends are too often similar: the "witches" were killed one way or another, the teacher is 'crucified' in other ways (loss of job, family, listed as a sexual predator if wrongly convicted, and even death by suicide). If the witch trials you have a group of youthful girls that made accusations against community members that they or their parents had issues with, children make accusations against persons of authority they have issues with (low grades, discipline, etc.).

Children under the age of five or six DO lie. Don't kid yourself. This generation of kids is far more advanced than ever.

Underemployed -

I hate to disagree with you, but children under the age of five or six do lie, and do it for a variety of reasons. Unlike NCGrammy, I don't think it has anything to do with "this generation;" take the time to do some research on the McMartin Preschool debacle in California during the 1980's -

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McMartin_preschool_trial

Did the children intentionally lie? I won't debate that point, because I don't think anyone knows enough about the psychology of these kids to make that determination - whatever the reason that the claims were made, it destroyed a family with repurcussions all the way until their deaths. And remember, we are talking over 300 children... unfortunately, in our zeal to protect the young, people's lives get destroyed and it just seems that apologies are too little, too late when this happens.

Uh, children under the age of 5 lie all the time. They just don't understand the concept of "truth". Kids will say almost anything to make adults feel happy, they want to please. Try reading up on the "McMartin Pre-School" case, where dozens of children were found to have lied, why? Because they were interviewed by novice social workers instead of seasoned detectives. The kids lied because they wanted to please the interviewers.

To make a blanket statement like: "Kids under 5 don't lie" is to ignore facts and human nature.

If you really think that children under the age if 5 don't lie, you haven't been around very many children or else you are delusional. I knew a 3 year old that was probably a sociopath. She was the most beautiful little thing you could imagine but you didn't dare be alone with her. Her imagination had no limits. She told so many lies we finally videotaped her and proved she was hurting other kids then lying her head off about it. It only gets worse as they get older in many cases.

Mark Twain was a very wise man and knew a lot about human nature. Love this quote!

Close. Their name was McMartin and it took place in 1983. HBO did a movie about it. I think it was called "Guilty Until Proven Innocent". The horrible things the people had to endure until a jury found them not guilty will make you sick. The way the kids were coached and rewarded went way beyond just asking leading questions. Pretty soon the kids realized that the more fantastic and horrible a story they would tell, the bigger the reward they would get. Talk about witness tampering by the prosecution!!! Someone hit the nail on the head when they said that molestation accusation are the new Salem Witch Trials. Even if a person is innocent, their life is turned into a trainwreck, while the accusers get off scot-free.

Mr. Warren -

I see some similarities with Colonial Salem. Hmmm.

Any reasonable person would agree. Its also nauseating to think that a teacher can have their life ruined so easily for little more than just doing their job and flunking poor students while the community doesn't even consider the possibility that kids could just be vindictive lying brats. An example or precedent should be made out of these kids.