Posted on 11/28/2007 11:04:58 AM PST by RedsHunter
Lawsuit seeks over $25,000 in damages
NELSONVILLE - A Nelsonville-York School District gym teacher has sued a Nelsonville couple who have been claiming he acted abusively toward their son.
Teacher Anthony Mollica of Athens filed the lawsuit last week in Athens County Common Pleas Court against Robert and Tia Chubb of Nelsonville. The lawsuit accuses the Chubbs of a "campaign of defamation" and seeks more than $25,000 in compensatory damages and an award of punitive damages to be determined later.
In previous articles about the situation, Brown News Service has not used Mollica's name because he has not been officially charged with any offense. His name is being used in this article because he filed a public lawsuit, and his attorney mailed a copy of the lawsuit to a Brown publication.
The day before Mollica filed his lawsuit, Robert Chubb filed a petition in Athens County Common Pleas Court seeking a protection order against Mollica on behalf of Chubb's 6-year-old-son and 8-year-old-daughter. A hearing on the protection order is set for Thursday.
In the petition, Chubb alleges that on Oct. 12 his son was grabbed by his shirt by Mollica and "yelled at so loudly that he spit on my son's face." Chubb also alleges in the petition that on Oct. 16 Mollica stared at his son "in a menacing way" and on Oct. 17 "repeatedly walked through the lunchroom and stared at my son."
Nelsonville police looked into those allegations, as well as claims involving other students. According to a police report, Prosecutor Rick Hedges advised that there was insufficient evidence against Mollica to prosecute him. An internal investigation was conducted by elementary school Principal Theresa Dearth, but documents provided by the school district indicate no substantial evidence of abuse was found.
Earlier in the week, the school board authorized the hiring of an attorney to conduct an independent evaluation of the allegations.
In his lawsuit, Mollica says that he "expressly and vehemently denies" the allegations made by the Chubbs.
"Defendants have engaged in a malicious, willful and wanton attack on plaintiff Mollica," his lawsuit asserts, and have "pursued false complaints with Athens County Children Services, the Nelsonville City Police Department and NYCS (Nelsonville-York City School System)..."
Attached to Mollica's lawsuit is a document, apparently distributed by Tia Chubb, which advises parents to talk to their children about how they are treated in gym class and includes definitions of assault, abuse and intimidation. "This information is for education and awareness, not to accuse unjustly anyone," the document states. It does not include Mollica's name.
Also attached to the lawsuit is a letter to the editor from Robert Chubb that was printed in The Athens Messenger. The letter, which does not include Mollica's name, talks about the alleged difficulty in pursuing a complaint against a teacher.
There is also a letter to the school board, signed by Tia Chubb, that includes the Chubbs' allegations against Mollica, who is named in the letter.
In addition, attached as exhibits in the Mollica lawsuit are affidavits that were apparently part of a divorce proceeding involving the Chubbs. In her affidavit, Tia Chubb accuses her husband of being physically and verbally abusive to her children. In his affidavit, Robert Chubb says he has a "warm, caring and nurturing" relationship with his children, and on rare occasions would express "normal parental frustrations." The divorce action was dismissed in January.
I lived in mortal fear of my gym teachers, who were also the football and basketball coaches.........
I went to school in the 1950's, graduated HS in 1960. Back then if a kids father had ever done what this man is doing here, his kid would have spent the rest of his days in school walking around with an atomic wedgie. And that would have been the lesser part of what he would have to suffer through.
Bring discipline back to the classroom.
6-year-old-son and 8-year-old-daughter. A hearing on the protection order is set for Thursday.
They have gym teachers at that age?
My gym teacher was the football/baseball/track coach too. If you look up the word “sh..head” in the dictionary you would see his photo there. I despised this P.O.S. and swore I would have the last laugh. Years later, I flew for a major airline and we were grounded in Moscow due to weather, etc. In the crowd of tourist/teachers, all trying to get back to the U.S., was my “old coach.” A few words to the ticket agents on duty and “coach” got home three days later than all of his fellow travelors as his paperwork was not “correct”-according to the Russian government police. I laughed all of the way home as I had spoken with him at the airport and told him to be certain his paperwork was in order. I still smile about this when I think of it.
LOL. As they say, “Be nice to the little people going up, because they’re the same ones you meet going down.”
I had a football coach my sophomore year in high school. He was also my older brother’s football coach at the same time, on a different team - the varsity team. And, concurrently that coach was also my Algebra-II teacher.
My older brother was better at playing football than was I. Apparently, the coach had equal expectations of me and was very disappointed I did not live up to them. He would spend the first 15 minutes of my Algebra-II class, letting the entire class know all the ways I was no match for my brother on the football field. Math, until then, since grade-school, had always been one of my best subjects. I asked him one day after class if he could keep the subject of football and me to football-practice and the games. He would only answer that he’d think about it, but he never did. I got my sophomore class counselor to get me switched out of my coach’s Algebra II class. He did, but there was no other Algebra II classes open so I had to take another subject. I did take geometry the following year, but I finished high-school NOT having advanced to Calculus and chose not to pursue a science major in college. Was my Algebra II class experience the sole cause of my later study choices? No, probably not, but it was probably one influence.
Yet, and here is my point, neither I nor my parents would have dreamed of suing that coach and I would not think of doing so today if I had a child in the same situation.
The law cannot be used to resolve, or compensate, for 100% of all our conflicts in life, unless we want to be perpetual human infants, sheltered by the threat of lawsuits to make life as placid and tranquil as a closed-in body of water that never knows a ripple across its surface. Somehow, I think we would devolve under those circumstances, in fact, I think we have human examples already that demonstrate the possibility.
In my school growing up any teacher could lay the smack down on a kid, and it was understood that you needed to behave. The parents of this kids have got to be lieberal idiots.
Yes, because all physical activity is organized now. Can't have the little darlins running around unsupervised-they might play dodgeball or games where they (gasp!) keep score.
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