Former Loudoun County Superintendent Found Guilty Of Unlawfully Firing Teacher After Grand Jury Testimony
Brandon Poulter on September 29, 2023
A trial against former Loudon County Superintendent Scott Ziegler reached its verdict Friday and found him to be guilty of unlawfully firing a teacher, according to ABC 7 News.
Ziegler was accused of firing a teacher after she testified to a grand jury investigating sexual assaults in Loudoun County Public Schools, according to ABC 7 News. Ziegler was found to be guilty of unlawfully firing a teacher, a misdemeanor, but not guilty of retaliating.
Erin Brooks, who received the Special Education Teacher Award in 2021, testified in the trial that she, as well as a colleague, experienced numerous inappropriate touching attempts by a student and told school officials about the incidents, according to Loudoun Now. She was asked to testify before the special grand jury investigating LCPS in April 2022, and was informed in May of that year that her contract would not be renewed.
John Beatty, an LCPS school board member, testified at the trial that Ziegler that he fired her because she had spoken to the grand jury, according to ABC 7 News.
LCPS has come under national attention in recent years for two incidents in which the school board denied knowledge of any sexual assaults.
Scott Smith, the father of one girl who had been sexually assaulted by a male student who claimed to be “gender fluid”, showed up at a school board meeting to protest a transgender bathroom policy and was arrested in June 2021. Republican Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin pardoned Smith on Sept. 8.
The Loudon County school board voted to fire Ziegler after a report from a special grand jury in December 2022 that said Ziegler had “dropped the ball” on student safety after multiple sexual assault cases.
LCPS did not immediately respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment.
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