Court allows parents to file claim against Long Beach schools

A Nassau County Supreme Court judge granted a motion on July 26 for five parents to file a late claim against the Long Beach School District, accusing it of failing to act on complaints of abuse of their severely autistic children by their former special education teacher.

The court’s approval comes after the parents waited months to see if they could launch a $25 million lawsuit against the district, since the petition was filed in April, more than 90 days after the alleged incidents. It claims that at least 11 teacher’s assistants filed complaints about the teacher, Lisa Weitzman, during the seven years that she worked at Long Beach Middle School, and that school officials did not investigate the allegations.

“The delay in filing the notice of claim by petitioners is excusable due to the fact that petitioners are infants and all suffer from mental disabilities which affect their ability to communicate,” Judge Anthony Parga wrote in his decision. “…The guardians/parents of said petitioners could not have possibly known about the abuse until the allegations for which the teacher was being investigated came to light by some other sources other than the infant disabled children.”

The district is currently involved in a disciplinary hearing that could result in Weitzman’s firing, citing eight charges against her, including using a bathroom as a “time-out” room, threatening to restrain a student with zip ties and digging her stiletto heels into a child’s feet, all of which Weitzman has denied. The hearing began in March and is scheduled to continue in September. Weitzman was removed from the class in November of 2014.

Other charges outlined in the petition that are not listed in the district’s formal charges against Weitzman include allegations that she forced a male student to masturbate in front of his classmates; that she fed the children prohibited food items to give them gastrointestinal symptoms in an effort to make them miss school; and that she sprayed Lysol and other deodorants on them.

“We are all very pleased that the judge has given us an opportunity to at least present our arguments in a lawsuit,” said Gerard Misk, the attorney for the parents. “If we cannot resolve this matter with the school district, we have every intention of proceeding with a lawsuit against them, as well as the teacher and various aides involved.”

Two parents of another child in the class filed a federal lawsuit against the district in April.

Weitzman’s attorney, Debra Wabnik, said that any lawsuit by the parents based on Weitzman’s alleged conduct “will be baseless,” adding that her client never harmed her students. Weitzman, meanwhile, filed her own lawsuit against the school district on June 27 in U.S. District Court, claiming that school officials did not provide her with qualified teaching assistants, a curriculum, emergency protocols for aggressive students and other necessary services, according to court documents.

“She advocated for her students when they were not provided with the same benefits that other students received, like ‘specials’ such as gym and woodworking, a teaching curriculum, busing, and the privilege to attend graduation and go on school trips,” Wabnik told the Herald. “She also fought for a crisis intervention protocol and a safe separate location for her violent and aggressive students, to protect her students and her staff. But mostly she fought for her students to be accepted by the district. These parents have been misled, and their ire is mistakenly directed toward Ms. Weitzman rather than the district that was out of compliance and failed their children.”

Defendants in Weitzman’s suit include Sabrina Cantore, executive director of pupil personnel services, former Director of Human Resources Randie Berger, Special Education Coordinator Vincent Russo, Schools Superintendent David Weiss and four teaching assistants. According to the complaint, each of the defendants “provided false and defamatory testimony during the hearing, in an attempt to harm [Weitzman] and remove her from the district, all because she had advocated on behalf of the [autistic] students.”

Long Beach school officials did not immediately respond to the Herald’s request for comment on either case, but have said that the district “has complied, and will continue to comply, with all federal and state legal requirements regarding complaints to the district about possible abuse or mistreatment of our students.”