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The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Monday, March 30, 2009
An embattled Gwinnett County elementary school principal is under fire for ordering a student to shock himself with a pen he carried to school that emits a low current.
Esther Adames-Jimenez, principal of Beaver Ridge Elementary School, apparently wanted to teach the student a lesson.
So when the boy was summoned into her office to face discipline consequences for bringing the toy to class, Adames-Jimenez asked the student to turn the pen on himself, said Gwinnett school officials.
“Her actions reflect poor judgement,” said Sloan Roach, a spokesperson for Gwinnett County Public Schools. “It clearly violates our discipline procedures.”
Beaver Ridge faculty reported their principal to Gwinnett schools’ human resources officials after the incident.
Adames-Jimenez could not be reached for comment Monday.
This is not the first time the principal’s judgement has come under scrutiny for discipline allegations.
She was placed on paid administrative leave from East Boston Early Education Center in 1999 amid allegations that she disciplined a 4-year-old who bit classmates by holding that student down so his victims could bite him back. The incident was investigated by school officials and the Massachusetts Department of Social Services. That department found that no physical abuse of the child had occurred but said the principal’s “handling of this situation was not in good judgment,” according to a report by The Associated Press. Adames-Jimenez was reinstated without disciplinary action. The mother of the disciplined student, however, filed a civil lawsuit against Adames-Jimenez and the Boston school in June 2000 alleging assault. The case was settled for an undisclosed sum in August 2001.
Adames-Jimenez told the AJC in June 2008 the Boston allegations were “false.” “The truth is that I never touched the child,” she said earlier in a statement.
“Upon completion of the investigation, I was able to work in the same school for five more years, until the superintendent invited me to open another school,” she said.
Last school year in Gwinnett County, the principal was investigated by human resources and the Georgia Professional Standards Commission for mishandling a national standardized test and a state exam.
She was accused of losing an examiner’s manual containing test questions during the exam, among other things. She received a warning from the Professional Standards Commission in November 2008 on the ethics breach.
In the latest incident, Adames-Jimenez was issued a directive warning her to follow school discipline procedures. Gwinnett Schools Human Resources chief Frances Davis did not report the incident to the state ethics agency, Roach said, because findings did not warrant it.
Adames-Jimenez resigned during the investigation.
“The district was going to recommend that her contract not be renewed next school year,” Roach said “This incident was taken into consideration as well as other issues we’ve had. Ms. Adames-Jimenez was aware of that when she tendered her resignation.”
The principal will be allowed to stay on at Beaver Ridge through the end of the school year, but she will have a shadow monitoring her leadership.
Betty Dominy, a former Gwinnett principal, executive director for school improvement and a principal mentor, will serve as interim principal at Beaver Ridge and work with Adames-Jimenez “to aid in the leadership transition,” Roach said.
This article found at ajc.com
WATERVILLE -- A Connecticut man who showed up Wednesday at District Court to face an assault charge was arrested by police in connection with heroin found last month near the Head Start school in the South End.As an added bonus, police said, Darryl Copeland, 25, of Hartford, had 98 bags of heroin on him Wednesday, adding new, more serious charges.
Police had been waiting for Copeland to return, Deputy Chief Charles Rumsey said.
Nine packets of Blue Magic heroin were found March 4 behind the Kennebec Valley Community Action Program building.
Police said the discovery could have saved the life of a child who might have found the pretty packets and tasted the contents.
"It didn't take us very long to discover that the night prior to that heroin being discovered, Waterville police had actually detained Mr. Copeland right there on that corner for suspicion of an assault that had taken place in a cab," Rumsey said.
Copeland was interviewed and issued a summons to appear in court related to a fight that allegedly took place in the cab that night.
"His court date was today," Rumsey said.
He said investigators "put two and two together" after realizing that police had spoken to Copeland near where the heroin had been found.
Police ran Copeland's name and found he had arrests and convictions in Connecticut in 2002 for possession and sale of heroin, Rumsey said. A search warrant for Copeland and the vehicle in which he was a passenger was secured and police waited for the court date to arrive.
"When he came back up to Waterville for his court appearance today, we were watching and waiting for him," Rumsey said. "When he left the courthouse this afternoon Detective Chris Paradis and Office Dwayne Cloutier and a number of other police officers tailed him in the vehicle he was in from the courthouse down to the South End."
The car was parked near The Chez on Water Street, where police converged on the vehicle and searched Copeland and the car.
"In his right front pocket officers located 10 bundles of heroin -- there was 98 bags of heroin -- they are usually bundled 10 bags to a bundle," he said. "All marked Blue Magic and all packaged the very same way as the heroin that was recovered by KVCAP, which is a very unusual method of packaging heroin. We haven't seen it like this before."
He said the heroin is packaged in small glassine bags and stamped Blue Magic, then are encapsulated in black plastic, almost like a bubble pack.
Each bag is about one-tenth of a gram and sells for $25-30. Ten bags make up one gram of heroin. Copeland is charged with aggravated trafficking in heroin, a Class A felony, punishable by up to 30 years in prison for the 98 bags seized Wednesday. The charge is aggravated by the amount of heroin -- valued at about $3,000 -- and by its proximity to the Head Start school and the alternative education school on Silver Street, Rumsey said. He is charged additionally with possession of about three grams of cocaine and prescription pills. The charge related to the March 4 heroin case is Class B felony, furnishing drugs, punishable by up to 10 years. The charge is not aggravated further due to the relatively small quantity of drugs -- nine bags -- in that case, according to Rumsey said.
Bail was set at $31,500 cash.
Waterville Police Chief Joseph Massey said he was pleased with the resolution of the case. He said heroin found within 20 feet of any school touches a nerve.
"Officers Paradis and Cloutier have done a lot of work over the last month on this particular case and it all came together for them today," Massey said. "In addition, patrol officers were instrumental in being kind of the eyes and ears, relaying information to them as to what they were looking for -- how and who to identify when he came back to the city.
"What I like is the good, consistent effort to get drugs off the street, to arrest drug dealers and I think it's working," he said.
Copeland is scheduled to appear in Kennebec County Superior Court on July 8, but his initial appearance could be sometime this week.
Quoted from http://morningsentinel.mainetoday.com/news/local/4952592.html:
By Morning Sentinel Staff
A 4-mile cow manure spill through three towns kept residents plugging their noses Monday and sent motorists to area car washes.
The mystery of who spilled the manure on Route 100A from Winslow to Benton and into Clinton remained unsolved as of Monday night.
But Benton Road Commissioner Kenneth Dudley tried to figure it out. He followed the manure spill, hoping to find the source -- or the destination -- and used his plow truck to scrape it off the road even though he isn't responsible for the state-owned highway.
"The Town Office called me and said that somebody'd come in there and complained in there and he called it 'cow poop,' so I thought I'll go look -- I'm coming into town anyways," Dudley said.
"I was down to Waterville and I came through and it was quite messy in the road just about where the town line was and it disappeared on that flat. I lost it near Bellsqueeze Road. I don't really know where it went to. I didn't smell nothing at first. I had a guy with me and he said he could sure smell it."
The trail of manure in the northbound lane of Route 100A started in Winslow, just south of the Benton town line, continued past Libby's Variety store, the Town Office and Dan's Used Cars, then headed toward Clinton.
Once in Clinton it traveled another couple of miles and turned west off the paved road just before a red farmhouse.
The manure followed a snowy field up to the red horizon where the sun was setting around 4:45 p.m. Farm equipment was parked next to a big pile.
At Libby's store, owner Bob Libby was eating a sandwich for supper and hadn't counted on it being accompanied by the odor of manure.
"I just got in and I said, 'What in hell smells?'" he recalled.
His wife, Diane, came into the store after walking the dog. She said people had been talking about the manure spill all day.
"Some lady came in and she had a sizable amount on her car," she said. "She got some coins to go to the car wash."
Stopping at Libby's on her way home from work, Pamela Hall, like everyone else in town, was talking about the stench in the road. She said she drove for what seemed like miles, with the odor never letting up.
"It's like, phew," Hall said. "I began to think maybe I stepped in something. I couldn't imagine what it was because the smell went on so long."
Diane Libby preferred to look at the positive side of the situation.
"It's good country air, that's all," she said. "We're going to have some good green grass along the side of the road."
Smelly stuff smears road Trail of cow manure is talk in 3 towns
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