Posted on 05/06/2003 9:35:22 AM PDT by anniegetyourgun
BARRE – John Mott and Tom Treece have at least one thing in common. Make that two.
Both men think they have been unfairly accused and, if you believe their critics, both have had a chilling impact on students at Spaulding High School.
Mott is the Barre Town police officer who admits he spent part of an early morning break last month photographing student projects in the classroom of a controversial history teacher.
Treece is that teacher. A passionate pacifist, he has been skewered publicly by critics who say he is pedaling his personal political views to the students in his class. Part of the proof, critics say, is in the photographs Mott took when he visited the high school April 9 while on duty, in uniform, and out of his jurisdiction.
The photographs were taken at around 1:30 a.m. after Mott, who once worked at Spaulding, persuaded a custodian to unlock the door to the classroom Treece shares with another teacher.
Mott isn’t apologizing for his actions and says he has at least temporarily refused orders from Barre Town Police Chief Michael Stevens and Town Manager Carl Rogers to supply school officials with copies of the photographs.
“I’m going to speak to an attorney first,” he said.
Mott disputes an account of the April 9 incident contained in a letter written by school Superintendent Dorothy Anderson to the police chief.
Specifically, Mott disputes Anderson’s claim that he “banged on the front door” of the high school to get the attention of night custodian Arnold Cliche, and that Cliche opened the door and let him in.
“It didn’t happen that way,” he said.
According to Mott, he entered the school through an unlocked maintenance door, found Cliche and asked him to unlock the door to Treece’s classroom room so he could take photographs with his personal camera. Although he was on duty at the time, Mott maintains that he was on a break and wanted to photograph student projects that offended him as an American and a retired military man.
“I wanted everybody else to see what was in that room. You can’t explain it,” he said.
Among the student projects that Mott said he photographed were a poster of the President Bush with duct tape over his mouth and a large papier-mâché combat boot with the American flag stuffed inside stepping on a doll. He said there also were pictures of Cuban dictator Fidel Castro and his former chief lieutenant, Ernesto “Che” Guevara, posted on the walls.
“Having spent 30 years in uniform, I was insulted,” he said. “… I’m just taking a stand on what happens in that classroom as a resident and a voter and a taxpayer of this community.”
Mott said he took the photographs less than 48 hours after attending a school board meeting at which several residents complained about what they claimed was an attempt to “indoctrinate” not “educate” students.
School officials have rejected that notion, defending Treece as a “thought-provoking” teacher who provides students in his public issues class with resources from the full spectrum of political perspectives.
“As a teacher he (Treece) does present all sides of an issue,” Anderson said.
Anderson said she was concerned that Mott used his uniform to gain access to a locked classroom after hours without supervision.
“I find this behavior, at the very least, in violation of our policy for visitors at the school,” she wrote in her letter to the police chief. “I also find it disturbing that a police officer would wear his uniform under such circumstances thereby intimidating our employee (Cliche) into letting him in the building at a very unusual hour.”
Anderson said she met with the police chief and the town manager on Friday to discuss her concerns and to reiterate her request for copies of the photographs Mott took and has been circulating in the community. She said Mott had not yet complied with that request, which is based solely on her desire to confirm the photographs were not doctored in any way.
“We’re not embarrassed about what was in that classroom,” she said. “We just want to make sure that the pictures he (Mott) took are an accurate reflection of what the classroom looked like.”
Mott said the photographs he took are authentic and accused school officials of “tap-dancing” around an issue that was brought to their attention last month by using the circumstances under which he entered Treece’s classroom as a diversion.
“It leads me to believe they are out witch-hunting,” he said.
Treece said he knows the feeling. He says Mott and his other detractors don’t have a clue about what he does in his classroom, but that hasn’t stopped them from jumping to conclusions based on his personal political views.
“None of these parents know me in any way,” he said. “They just think they know me. Everything they know about me is hearsay. They don’t have kids in my class. They have taken lies and innuendoes and run with them.”
Treece does not hide his personal views and acknowledges his public criticisms of the war in Iraq and President Bush have irked many in the community. However, he said their contention that he is force-feeding his views to Spaulding students is simply wrong.
“I tell kids from day one: ‘I don’t want you to agree with me, I want you to be informed and think for yourselves,” he said. “I have never squashed dissent in my class in any way shape or form.”
Treece said his message to students is simple: “Defend what you believe and if you can’t defend it I’m going to pick holes in your argument no matter what side of the issue you’re on.”
Treece said he supplies his students with a broad range of resources and encourages them to use them to come to their own conclusions.
“My goal in that class is to get kids to think and be critical of everything they read and hear and see,” he said.
Treece said he’s tired of being painted as anti-American simply because he challenges students not to take what anyone – not the president, their parents, or even he – says at face value.
“I want them to understand that everybody’s got an agenda … everybody,” he said.
Treece said that goes for his detractors, some of whom are using the controversy over a six-word sentence – “All hail the idiot boy king” – that he posted on a bulletin board next to a picture of President Bush as a reason to reject the high school budget. The budget is scheduled for a re-vote next week.
“They’re out to get the budget and they’ve made me their whipping boy,” he said.
Treece makes no apologies for how he conducts his classes or for his own political views. In retrospect, he said, the comment he posted about Bush was probably too direct.
The board meets at 7 p.m. in the high school library. Like the Malones, both Mott and Treece said they plan to attend.
“I did not recognize how fragile people’s feelings were at the time,” he said. “It was horrible timing on my part.”
If he had it to do over again, Treece said he would spell out the same sentiments in two pages of text that wouldn’t have offended anyone.
Paul and Norma Malone, the local couple who first took issue with the comment Treece posted on the board, insist they’re not out to scuttle the budget, but want to restore balance in the curriculum at Spaulding.
“Our position has been and still is there should be a balance in that curriculum and respect in that school,” said Paul Malone.
Although the couple’s criticism is not limited to Treece, they admit his comment served as a springboard for their effort.
“It’s not an issue of freedom of speech. That was never the issue,” he said. “It’s an issue of balance and it’s an issue of professionalism.”
Based on discussions with faculty, parents and students, Norma Malone said students from a largely conservative community are being urged to view the world to through a liberal lens.
“There’s nothing from the center or from the right,” she said, rejecting Treece’s comments to the contrary.
The Malones, who have formed the group “Citizens Advocating Responsible Education,” say they plan to attend tonight’s school board meeting and present a copy of a petition signed by several hundred supporters. The petition states in part: “Students must be provided a thorough, factual, unbiased study of the history of our nation, the importance of our government institutions, and the significance of our political traditions so as to engender civic duty and respect for our national values.”
In order to accomplish that goal, the petition suggests revisions to the school’s policy regarding academic freedom and the appointment of community members to the school board’s curriculum committee.
That’s irrelevant. He was not conducting a police investigation simply acting in his capacity as a citizen.
Out of his jurisdiction at 0130, in uniform, for the express purpose of doing a personal errand while in uniform -- you can't find anything wrong with anything there?
So it was a personal relationship, not the use of his uniform.
We don't know that. He may be protecting the janitor, but we don't know anything about whether Mott knew Cliche or not.
As for opinions on reacting to a political agenda, that is an opinion, not illegal.
Mott's actions -- political or not -- could have been undertaken without the use of a uniform. Political opinions and Mott's reaction thereto, does not justify what he did.
Some times I wonder. A blanket statement that what I wrote has no relevance is pretty lame since you didn't bother to back up your claim or rebut my points.
Look at this ridiculous quote Cops don't have the right to do anything they want any time they want. No one said this quit putting words into our mouths.
You are the one who claims he can go into a school at 1AM in the morning while in uniform and on duty to perform tasks completely unrelated to the performance of his job just because he wants to. If the term jurisdiction doesn't have any meaning for you, perhaps it would help if you looked the word up. I'm told there are many free dictionaries to be had on this internet thing.
If he can enter any place (even after hours) while on duty and in uniform and instruct someone to allow him to inspect a locked room when he has no evidence or suspicion that a crime had or was about to take place, then what restraints of conduct would you say he has on him, if any? Courts have consistantly ruled against this type of conduct. That is why there are firm rules about such things in place, and why he may (I'd argue 'should') very well lose his job. He's performing an unlawful action under color of the law.
I realize there are a lot of folks out there who would like for cops to be able to bust heads, kick ass and take names in the manner portrayed so often on the cop drama shows, but the facts are that this type of behavior is not only illegal, but immoral. Are you claiming that the cop can just walk into the school, start opening lockers, looking in offices, and in general just engage in a fishing expedition merely because it is a public building during part of the day? The rationalizations that people make in defense of the state are absolutely astounding.
Now, have that cop go to the mayor's office, or the offices of the school board, unlock a file cabinet and copy official papers after hours without the permission of those officials. See how stupid YOU look.
If a cop is on-duty at a school, he is there at the request of the school board and the city council. He was NOT at the school after hours on official duty - instead, he used his badge and his relationship with the custodian to go somewhere he should not have been allowed to go. The fact that the brass are asking for his pictures and he is talking to a lawyer first shows that what he did was, at the very least, unethical.
Who is being attacked? No one is going to fall for that. Lookie at this one. it comes to a cop trying to squelch someone's opinion can you explain how you got here? The guy was just taking pictures. How is that squelching opinion? Try using that one on the news media.
You are making absolutely NO sense now.
This is the clincher the same methods can be used against YOU later Like Liberals haven't done it already. Do you really think that students in subjectively graded classes don't get hammered by these peace loving teachers. I have personally seen these all knowing professors laugh out load about how they destroy these students. Don't tell me that liberals care so much about free speech.
I'm not talking about free speech. I am talking about a police officer using the police power of his badge to gain access to a location that he should NOT have accessed without a warrant or a report of a crime in process, while on official duty, because of a POLITICAL difference. That is the kind of crap that leads to a banana republic where cops crack down on dissidents. It already seems that the public is making its case to the school board about the teacher. That is the proper venue for this, not the actions of a rogue cop.
While on police duty. While on the public payroll. And without the consent of the property owners, namely the school board.
It's scary how some folks on FR will condone means like this because they applaud the end. Yeesh...
Exactly.
Ummm, if the cop is to be believed, he trespassed through an unlocked door.
And if the school is to be believed, the janitor let him in because of he was in a policeman's uniform.
If you let a police officer onto your property after he asks to be let in, he's justified in being there.
A policeman outside his jurisdiction has no justification for being there. And because Mott admits he was on personal business, he really and truly had no business there.
Warrants are immaterial in this case: Mott was trespassing.
So the public approaches the school board and voices their opposition. The school board, being duly elected by the public, can decide to tell the teacher to can the socialism studies or tell the public to stuff it. And the public, if they disagree with the school board, can elect another one next year.
Having a cop access a locked school room while on duty in pursuit of his own political agenda is NOT the proper way to attack this problem.
WRONG! If teacher Treece had showed up in civvies, the janitor would have let him in. Had Treece decided that the evidence of his unprofessional influence in his classroom may lead to his firing, he could have shown up in the middle of the night, walked into his room to remove the projects from display and not even bothered the custodian.
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