EDITORIAL – Firing principal right; punish students, too

A high school student in Ohio allegedly pulled a fellow student onto an auditorium stage and… A high school student in Ohio allegedly pulled a fellow student onto an auditorium stage and ordered her to be quiet. He then pushed her to her knees and forced her to perform oral sex on him, threatening that if she screamed, he would get his friends to punch her.

At least that’s how one student tells the story.

But according to assistant principal Richard Watson, who watched a videotape of the incident with other school administrators, there was “no coercion.” All they saw was a special-education student with a speech defect perform oral sex with two male students while two other male students watched.

What’s shocking is that after learning of the incident, school officials did not immediately call the girl’s father, nor did they call the police. Incidentally, the school police officer was not at the school on the date of the alleged attack — March 9, 2005.

Because they failed to notify the police and urged the girl’s father to avoid contacting the authorities out of concerns that reporters would become aware of the assault, the principal at Mifflin High School in Columbus, Ohio was fired, and four assistant principals were suspended.

Principal Regina Crenshaw and Watson claim that the girl would endure “further mental trauma” if news from police dispatcher’s radio calls was be picked up by television reporters.

It wasn’t up to the principal to mishandle the claim behind the mask of protecting a student who had already been violated.

Most media outlets have specific policies against publishing names of rape and sexual assault victims, particularly underage ones. And that’s what this was — rape. Minutes after the incident, the girl told a special-education teacher that she had been forced to have oral sex with two boys behind the curtain on stage. She said they only stopped when someone arrived and scared the boys.

The school district spokesman declined to say whether or not the boys, all under the age of 18, had been suspended.

The boys should be punished, of course, and after the police have concluded their investigation, the punishment should come from both school and police authorities.

How many detentions would it take to show these boys that what they did was wrong? Are they even being punished at all? They even left evidence behind in the form of a videotape. The age-old “boys will be boys” excuse usually used when students throw spitballs at classmates or start food fights certainly does not suffice in this case. These students committed a sex crime.

And the supervising adults acted with sheer insensitivity and insincerity. Perhaps the principal and assistant principal Watson can be charged with some form of obstruction of justice or negligence.

Kudos to the school district for getting rid of a principal who finds it more important to shun the media than to provide safety and order within the school’s walls.