District Discovers Docs Showing Teacher Suspected of Crime Received No Discipline
https://www.voiceofsandiego.org/topics/education/district-discovers-docs-showing-teacher-suspected-of-crime-received-no-discipline/
San Diego Unified said for years it had no records of complaints against La Jolla High School teacher Martin Teachworth. Now, it has provided documents showing school police believed he committed a crime against a student and that other students complained about inappropriate touching for years, yet officials took no action against him.
Newly obtained documents reveal that San Diego Unified investigated and confirmed allegations of groping by a teacher at La Jolla High School but allowed him to continue teaching for another decade, while more complaints built up. The district claimed to Voice of San Diego multiple times over a four-year period that it had no documents regarding complaints against the teacher, but now says it discovered them in a storage room.
Even when confronted with evidence in 2017 that it had withheld emails detailing complaints against the teacher, Martin Teachworth, the district continued to insist it had no records at all.
Now, four years after Voice of San Diego originally sought documents that would shed light on the students’ complaints and how the district handled them, San Diego Unified officials have provided records showing extensive documentation existed all along and that the district did not provide it, though it was legally required to under the California Public Records Act.
The documents reveal a wide chasm between the story the district stuck to for years, and the truth: Not only did it have documents in its possession, those documents show that although district officials considered Teachworth’s actions criminal in at least one instance and believed he engaged in a pattern of troubling behavior, they responded to most incidents by giving him a warning – or by doing nothing at all.
In 2003, after substantiating a complaint that Teachworth stuck his hand down a girl’s pants, district officials took no action against him. In the 2012-2013 school year, following several complaints that prompted district officials to call in school police, recommend calling Child Protective Services and to involve district lawyers, officials once again took no action against him.
Teachworth has since retired but is now being investigated by the California Commission on Teacher Credentialing.
San Diego Unified did not report any of the misconduct complaints against Teachworth to the state agency. It wasn’t until Loxie Gant and Maura Kanter, two of his former students, reported sexual harassment complaints directly to the state last year that the agency was able to review the allegations against Teachworth.
It was during the process of responding to that agency’s inquiries, which included a subpoena, that the district claims it discovered documents that it never provided in response to VOSD’s requests.