Posted on 06/06/2015 11:34:19 AM PDT by digger48
HILLSBOROUGH COUNTY, Fla. (WFLA) A Hillsborough school bus driver who resigned for personal reasons following a bus crash in March, was able to keep transporting students a week after submitting what a collector described as looking and smelling like chicken broth during a routine drug screening.
A second test the same day of the chicken broth sample turned out to be positive for pot, but the school district didnt find out until the day after Crews crashed her bus into a Toyota driven by David Senquiz and was cited by Tampa police for failure to yield the right of way.
Senquiz had just purchased his car three weeks earlier and it was totaled in the crash. He had to buy another car and is now saddled with car payments he didnt have before.
I had my life going one way and it just mixed everything up, said Senquiz.
None of the 26 kids on Crews bus that day had injuries, but the excited passengers sure threw a scare into Senquiz. All I heard was like children screaming, he said.
Its not a perfect system, said Hillsborough Public Schools General Manager of Transportation Jim Beekman. It is absolutely not a perfect system.
Beekman insists he is not allowed to keep a bus driver off the road unless a positive drug test comes back from the labeven in cases where the drug screening sample collector suspects a driver is trying to fake a sample with chicken broth or some other substance.
Thats what the federal law outlines that we have to do, Beekman said. He explained that short of a positive drug screen, the district has to have a stand down waiver from the federal DOT to take a driver off the road.
The DOT tells 24-Hour News 8s sister station WFLA the drug screen in question didnt fit into its required testing program so any rules regarding a stand down should have been up to the district.
Whatever the case, Crews kept driving.
It turns out the positive drug screening wasnt Crews first brush with marijuana, but that didnt stop the school district from hiring her as a driver last October. This information that youre sharing with me is brand new to me, Beekman told Eight On Your Side after hearing about Crews pre-employment arrests.
According to district personnel records, when Monica Nicole Crews applied for a job as a Hillsborough school bus driver in the Fall she admitted to an arrest back in 2010 for pot possession. Crews insisted it stemmed from a misunderstanding while she was a bartender at a bar raided by ATF for operating without a liquor license.
Crews said patrons threw down their drugs and she ended up prosecuted for someone elses discarded marijuana. She pleaded no contest, the judge withheld a formal conviction.
But Crews neglected to mention on her bus driver application that shed been arrested two other times in Hillsborough Countyonce in 2003 for domestic violence and once in 2010 for driving with a suspended or revoked license. Prosecutors later dropped both of those charges, but the school district still requires the reporting of any arrest beyond a minor traffic violation.
Beekman characterized the case of Monica Crews as a rare event in the district and insists that nearly all of the districts 1,000 or so bus drivers are drug-free, dedicated and safe.
Theyre awesome people who take care of our kids,said Beekman. So I hope people dont cast blanket over the rest of the people who are dong an amazing job every day.
Maybe so, but the story of bus driver Monica Crews brushes with drugs still perplexes David Senquiz. They wouldnt even let a lot of people get a job as a delivery guy for pizza, said Senquiz. Let alone a school bus with children on their hands.
Beekman insists that even though Crews resigned for personal reasons any job she applies for that requires a commercial driver license should bring to light her positive drug screen as a Hillsborough school bus driver.
Theyre required to contact us, Beekman said.
If you purchase a car on credit you are always saddled with car payments you didnt have before.
It looks like someone took a knife and slashed her quite a while back. Nasty scars.
I think you’re mixing up the alleged pot smoking female bus driver with the victim, a male in a destroyed car.
Maybe it’s his diet or something, I know a woman who could give a blood sample and out would come gravy.
Whoopie Goldberg’s twin?
Well this won’t help the legalize marijuana folkes. Pot smoker driving children...what could go wrong!
Oops!
I guess little Jamal’s lunch was a bit bitter that day
Yep, I’d feel a whole better if she was drunk instead.
Alcohol is already legal...legalize pot more instances of people abusing it as the stigma erodes.
When I worked security we had a guard that turned in apple juice.
The illegality of marijuana didn't stop her from smoking nor make her any less testable.
It seems at this point there's already more stigma around pot laws than around pot. And note that the legality of tobacco hasn't prevented an increasing stigma around that substance.
Keeping a dangerous substance like alcohol legal is just nuts.
The only thing crazier than making mind-altering substances legal is making them illegal.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.