Loudoun County Superintendent Scott Ziegler was fired by the school board Tuesday night in response to a grand jury report into the district’s handling of two sexual assaults committed by the same student.
The Northern Virginia district drew national attention last year after a parent accused it at a school board meeting of covering up the sexual assault of his daughter in which a biological boy wearing a skirt raped her in the bathroom. of girls. The suspect then transferred to another school in the district and assaulted another girl, facing charges in both cases.
The father alleged that the district had attempted to cover up his daughter’s assault to promote its transgender policy, which had been the subject of parental protests at LCPS school board meetings.
The grand jury report released Monday said the district was looking out for its own interests rather than the best interests of its students and that the school system “failed at every juncture.”
LOUDOUN COUNTY PUBLIC SCHOOLS BEAR ‘BURDEN OF GLAME’ FOR PREVENTABLE SEXUAL ASSAULT FINDS VIRGINIA GRAND JURY
Parents and community members attend a Loudoun County School Board meeting on June 22, 2021.
(REUTERS/Evelyn Hockstein)
LCPS displayed an “impressive lack of openness, transparency and accountability, both to the public and to the special grand jury” about its response to the sexual assaults, according to the report, which also condemned Ziegler for denying at a school board meeting June 2021 that he was aware of the first assault, which occurred in May of that year. The second assault was committed in October 2021.
Ziegler had told the board meeting that “the predatory transgender student or person simply doesn’t exist” and, as far as he knows, “we don’t have any records of assaults occurring in our bathrooms.”
But in an email dated May 28, the same day as the initial assault, the superintendent alerted school board members that an assault had been reported.
Loudoun County Superintendent Scott Ziegler was fired by the school board Tuesday night in response to a grand jury report into the district’s handling of two sexual assaults committed by the same student.
(Fox Digital News)
LOUDOUN COUNTY RESPONDS AFTER DAD SAYS SCHOOL DISTRICT TRIED TO HIDE ASSAULT IN HIS DAUGHTER’S BATHROOM
The grand jury report explained that the district failed on several points to “intervene and alter” the sequence of events leading up to the second assault. He also said the grand jury found no “coordinated cover-up” between school officials and the school board, but that the second assault “could and should have been prevented.”
“A remarkable lack of curiosity and adherence to operating in silos on the part of LCPS administrators is ultimately to blame for the October 6 incident,” the report stated, adding that LCPS “bears the lion’s share of the fault”.
According to emails detailed in the report, senior district officials met privately to discuss the first assault and tied it to Policy 8040, which allows students to use bathrooms and locker rooms that correspond to their gender identity.
The district had been accused of trying to cover up his daughter’s assault to promote its transgender policy.
(Photo by Ricky Carioti/The Washington Post via Getty Images)
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The grand jury concluded its report by giving LCPS eight recommendations to follow to increase school safety, transparency and communication.
The investigation is now complete and no charges have been issued.
The grand jury heard testimony from more than 40 witnesses and reviewed more than 100 pieces of evidence in its investigation. The report noted that the LCPS school board attempted to “frustrate, discredit and reject” the investigation.
