Mounting Evidence of Poor Handling of MCC Bathroom Incident

Since coming to light in May, a incident that happened in an upper elementary girl's bathroom at Mason County Central (MCC) in Scottville has become far greater than it ever needed to be just simply because the administrators have behaved unprofessionally, non-transparently, and against the public interest.  We reviewed and displayed an opinion by Angela Serna which questioned the actions after the fact by MCC administrators and how it could negatively affect the young girl's recovery from the incident in this article.  

                                Jerome Betts celebrating his son's achievement in a wrestling tournament

In this article, we will explore that topic further and notice other allegations made by the father of the victim in a recent "reader's forum", look at the police report generated by the incident, and review a video of the janitor's interview with the police.  Read Jerome Betts' letter to the editor of the local paper, and notice that he is as frustrated with erratic MCC staffers as he is with the poorly chosen words of the janitor.

We have frequently dealt with MCC Superintendent Jeff Mount and have found him a profoundly disturbing public servant who tries to keep non-exempt public records away from public view.  His lack of doing any kind of internal investigation into a serious issue, even when he officially stated that he had, shows he's able to lie without shame in order to try and save face.  He is not averse to draconian punishments for minor oversights when a student makes them, but let's see what he is alleged to have done in this case. 

According to Betts, Superintendent Mount said "privacy laws" shielded the girl's family from the school's internal actions regarding the incident, which Mount later self-identified as a lie.  Mount reportedly then said Betts was an irrelevant person as to what MCC did with staff decisions, which is another fib, at least in a school district where transparency isn't a dirty word and the superintendent follows the law.  Mount then tried to offer a 'separation' agreement after Betts was told another thing from the school principal.  

Making matters worse, that school principal and the lower elementary school principal published letters to the editor in this same paper that effectively covered the same ground in three ways:  1) they defended the character of the custodian, 2) they decried attacks of the janitor on social media as slanderous and wrong and 3) they avoided any sort of empathy with the young girl who felt threatened.  

Betts serves notice that the major attacks on social media have been made against his daughter and against her parents for not keeping quiet about a comment made by a MCC school employee that everybody including the employee, Scottville police, and even MCC administration has said could be interpreted as threatening.  The lack of concern for her and exceptional concern they show for the janitor makes them appear clueless as to how to handle such situations.  

The school board, shortly after the hubbub caused by the inappropriate responses by the MCC staff, decided behind closed doors in a totally closed process to rehire their failed superintendent for three more years.  Ostensibly, the MCC school board is telling Scottville area parents they supposedly serve that they value secrecy, fabrication, and incompetency over honor and transparency.

It wasn't the young girl's fault for telling her parents, it wasn't her parents' fault for protecting their daughter, the fault lay entirely on school personnel.  What the custodian did and said was minimal as to what ballooned this to a big problem, it was what the school superintendent did and said as a result.  It showed why MCC will have a whole lot more problems in leadership over the next three years.

It's hard not to commiserate a little with the custodian in this matter, however.  He has apparently had a long career without major incident, and felt obligated to resign, likely because of Mount's inability to honorably deal with and deescalate the situation.   As noted, the Scottville police were notified to investigate the problem, their findings were compiled in a report as seen here:

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That report was sent to the prosecutor who denied that the custodian's words deserved prosecution:  Warrant Action SPD 18-237.pdf

The victim has to deal with the issue created by a handful of MCC staff for the rest of her school career at MCC, and the perceptions of other students incited by members of that staff to treat her worse due to her part in getting the 'beloved janitor' to resign.  Principals Etchison and Kimes, the custodian's reputation should not concern you as much as your own reputations when you support what you and your superintendent did afterwards.

The police both interviewed the girl and then the custodian.  As the report and the officer do not suggest that the girl has said anything that was factually wrong, and since the custodian's interview corroborates it, that interview is not presented here.  The recording was in a format that YouTube was able to translate video, but not audio.  I have transcribed relevant portions of the consensual interview with custodian Jerry Young.

Young:  "Previously I cleaned up the boys bathroom, didn't know about the girls until I was leaving and Amanda in the office said why don't you get the girls.  Well, at that time they were getting ready for lunch and there are girls all over and I waited outside and I hollered from the bathroom door "Hey girls I have a mess to clean up, can you hurry up" and there were five or six girls in there and five or six left and I waited and waited and waited and waited went in and this girl is at the sink and she looked at me and I said "Are you scared of me?" she said "Nope" and I said "Well maybe you should be?" and I went into the stall cleaned it up and left.

SPD:  "Why did you ask her that?"
Young:  "Because I'm a sarcastic stupid old guy. I meant it as a joke." 
SPD:  "Ok, and course her being 11, she didn't..."
Young:  "Nobody understand sarcasm anymore. But that's all it was, I wasn't mad, I just say stupid things, and I say them to adults too."
SPD:  "Can you see why her parents might be a little bit concerned?"
Young:  "Oh yeah, after I said it, after I said it I'd say it was stupid, and right now, Mr. Kimes doesn't want me back in his building anymore, and I'm assuming he doesn't want the upper elementary to get the reputation the middle school with all the assaults that have taken place...
SPD:  "In all the 34 years have there been any other problems?"
Young:  "I've had a couple of kids tell them I shoved them and that was wrong, and they knew it was wrong. But no, I don't have any problems...

SPD:  "This was kind of a one time lapse of judgment type thing as far as your record goes."

Young:  "I hope so for the future too. That was Mike Baerwolf [a MCC staffer] on the phone he wants me to get together with the family and apologize... I have children of my own, they're grown now, but I have children of my own. As soon as I said it, I could hear that voice inside me-- "dummy" --I didn't mean to scare her I didn't mean to do anything, I just, I didn't come any closer to her than three feet when I closed the bathroom stall."

Custodian Jerry Young is responsible enough to realize that what he said was wrong, and is willing to apologize and atone for his poorly chosen words.  MCC administrators do not have that same degree of responsibility, and continue to put this family of victims into positions that they shouldn't have to be, and shouldn't have to defend.  

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Thanks for researching this information X. First of all the janitor should not have gone into the bathroom until he made sure it was empty. All he needed to do is confirm it so by asking if anyone was still using the bathroom. Why he didn't gives cause for concern. Secondly as soon as he saw the girl he should have turned around, exited and waited until the girl had left.  Thirdly, I had no idea Betts is African American, so I'm assuming his daughter is at least partially the same race. Could the janitors actions and statement to the girl have been racially motivated? Besides the fact that he walked into an occupied girls bathroom and stayed while a girl was still there is most disturbing to me. Adding to that, his comments to the girl could be interpreted as hostile intent. The janitor may not have any record of bad behavior in his 30 plus years with the school district but neither did Larry Nassar unti his recent prosecution.

I think a round of resignations should take place starting with the MCC administrators. Wipe the slate clean and hire some common sense conservatives. Get rid of the lefties and progressives who are in control and who cannot seem to grasp what has taken place. This is further evidence of how screwed up progressives are.

I commend Mr. Betts for not bringing in the racial element of this, and for the obvious commitment he has for his family.  I would have rather just shown a picture of Jerome without one of his kids, but I just wasn't able to find one where he wasn't around them.  I like how he shows concern for kids and has remained colorblind, perhaps he should be considered superintendent material.

We should all try to be colorblind in situations like this, but here is a question that should be contemplated.  If the custodian was an older version of Jerome Betts and the girl was a much younger (and female) version of Jerry Young and the same thing happened, would it have been handled the exact same way by the involved parties?  

I can certainly understand looking at this with colorblind filters but I think it is definitely a possibility that racial biased played into his actions and comments. Even without the picture of Mr. Betts, the police reports do state the race of the persons involved. If the janitor had suddenly become "stupid" as he stated, why at that particular time, and why being alone with a black girl? His statement made no sense when he said it to the girl and when he tried to explain it away. You make a good point about if the roles were reversed and Betts had been the janitor. If that had been the case we would be having a very different discussion. I just don't like how this situation happened or how it was handled by the school. If there were even the slightest question about what actually happened, creating doubts, some of this could be dismissed as one of the oops moments but that's not the case. This situation needs to be aired and properly vetted before public confidence can be restored. After all we are dealing with, at the least, inappropriate adult interaction with children. The school system should run a background check on all employees while summer vacation is in progress. Nip this in the bud.

As you noted in your original reply, Scottville administrators are of the progressive/Democrat persuasion, and by their policies and their history starting since before the Civil War, have proven themselves to be the biggest racists around, compartmentalizing every person into a meaningless pigeonhole that prevents us from realizing that color-blind society that reasonable people seek.  I have little doubt these closet-racists would betray their pedigree if the races were switched in this situation, but we will likely never find that out.

It doesn't matter what color she was, thats not the issue , The janitor upon seeing the girl should have said: I had thought everyone had left, exused himself ,turnaround and left. 

Not only is what he said of significance, who he said it to is also of great importance. His statement "Are you scared of me?" she said "Nope" and I said "Well maybe you should be?" was a very odd statement to make to anyone. Let's look at other scenarios where his comment might have been used. If he had said this to a white male teacher, I doubt any of this would be in the news, however if he had said it to a black male teacher that would be a different story.  If he had made his comment to a female teacher, we all know that, with the "me to" movement, there would have been female protests from the school halls to Lake Michigan. The fact that the person he said this to was not only a child but a black child is not insignificant, especially in a school district that is probably 98% white. I'm not trying to make this a racial issue but the racial component of this situation cannot be ignored.

I would have to say that racism is an underlying issue that can't be ignored, particularly with the Superintendent Jeff Mount's previous stance on the issue of denying a kid the right to self-expression of his rebelliousness, flying a confederate flag on the back of his truck in 2016.  According to the COLDNews

Mount said the flag, not the student, is banned from school property.

“We would like for him to come to school,” Mount said about the student. “If he keeps it on his truck he can park off campus.”

Mount said the student was told Friday that he would have to park the truck off campus if he kept the flag up.

“It’s banned because to many people it is a symbol of racism and slavery,” he said. “It has disrupted education before and all kids deserve a safe and orderly environment.”

Words that were perceived as threats and that could easily be perceived as racially motivated uttered by MCC staff weren't deemed disruptive by Mount this time.  If all kids deserve a safe and orderly environment, why didn't Jerome Betts get that assurance by Mount that his daughter would, rather than suggest the white guy who made a wild threat could still work at the MCC UE building while she was there with the administrative intention of 'keeping them separated'.  Segregation in this day and age, Jeff Mount?  You got some of them white robes in your closet?

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