By Vicki Hart
HE BEGAN TO tell her how beautiful she was, he wrapped his arms around her and pulled her very close to his body, hugging her and making contact with his body against hers. He attempted to kiss her on the mouth, he attempted to force her lips open with his tongue and put his hand on her thigh. She was trying to push him away and told him to stop..."
The beginning of a steamy novel?
Nope--just an excerpt from a June 1993 Pima County Sheriff's Department report quoting a 13-year-old girl at Cross Middle School describing her 66-year-old music teacher, Maurice Hill.
After this alleged incident, Hill was charged with sexual abuse of a minor and aggravated assault of a minor under age 15. Amphitheater School District officials confiscated his keys to the school and refused to renew his contract. Then he was arrested and assigned a court date.
Too bad that wasn't the end of the story.
With charges pending against him for the Amphi incident, Hill applied to the Tucson Unified School District in August 1993--and was immediately hired as a music teacher at Keen Elementary and Secrist Middle schools.
What's more, on March 11, 1994, while working for TUSD, Hill kept his court date for the Amphi incident, pleading guilty to aggravated assault of a minor. He was sentenced to receive counseling and to do eight hours of community service--your basic slap on the wrist.
Though court documents show his community service was to be completed by May 1, 1994, Hill apparently didn't take it seriously--court records also indicate he never completed the requirement. As a result, when a warrant for his arrest was issued in late February 1995, he approached his pastor at Christ Church United Methodist and got a letter stating, "Maurice Hill is requesting that his participation in the church choir cover his eight hours of community service."
The court accepted the pastor's letter and quashed the warrant.
Court files also reveal a mental health evaluation last April found Hill to be "stressed and depressed." Although TUSD personnel files are not public record, sources say a "Letter of Concern" was placed in his employee file about this time--after three girls complained Hill was touching them inappropriately.
By December, court records show, 12 more girls, ages 10 to 12, had accused him of various sexual contacts. All but one were his students at Secrist and Keen. The other was his private pupil at a local music shop.
Hill was arrested and jailed. This time he faced 14 felony counts, including molestation, aggravated assault of a minor, sexual abuse of a minor under 15 and sexual abuse. The girls accused him of trying to hug and kiss them and of touching their buttocks, thighs, breasts and vaginal areas.
In a classic case of locking the hen house after the weasel has run amok, TUSD officials put Hill on administrative leave and launched an internal investigation. In January, the TUSD School Board voted to fire him.
Last month Hill pleaded guilty to five Class Six felonies. Also, he agreed to surrender his teaching certificate and was released from jail--with the stipulation that he have no unsupervised contact with children--pending his March 30 sentencing.
TUSD officials claim that until Hill was arrested this past December, they were unaware of his June 1993 charge or his subsequent conviction.
How is this possible? Obviously it's a question a number of the victims' parents are asking while they explore the possibility of filing lawsuits against TUSD.
Rose Garcias, Keen Elementary School principal, refuses to comment. But TUSD spokesman George Martinez says the answer is simple--Hill falsified his employment history when he failed to mention he'd previously worked in the Amphi District. Martinez, however, is unable to say which, if any, of Hill's references were checked.
The local branch of the state Teacher Certification Office would say only that all Arizona teachers are fingerprinted. Berkeley Lunt, the Phoenix-based state director of teacher certification, refused to comment, saying Hill's case is "under investigation."
In fact, there is no clearinghouse for teachers in Arizona, and TUSD officials concede Hill's case is not particularly unusual. Like something slimy, Maurice Hill slipped through the cracks.
School officials claim privacy laws and individual rights restrict them when it comes to warning prospective employers about a work candidate's past. One school administrator says he always asks if there's any reason the applicant is not suitable for employment. Another says he asks if the former employer would hire the applicant again, but, he adds, even that is pushing it.
Some administrators say that when called upon to reference an individual they've fired, they simply give the dates of employment and decline to answer additional questions. This, they say, should serve as a code to the prospective employer that there's a problem.
Hill is scheduled to be sentenced March 30, but whatever he receives, it won't relieve the trauma experienced by his victims.
To help prevent future incidents, the judicial system must establish a clearinghouse to check for criminal records of those working with children--felonies and misdemeanors. And courts should include a system to inform schools when an employee or potential employee is convicted of a crime.
In these times of cheap computers and rapid data transmission, the Maurice Hills of our society could easily be stopped from preying on our children--and our school districts should not be allowed to plead ignorance.
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