{"id":5190,"date":"2014-04-06T07:47:21","date_gmt":"2014-04-06T11:47:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/chescotimes.com\/?p=5190"},"modified":"2014-04-06T07:47:21","modified_gmt":"2014-04-06T11:47:21","slug":"d-a-issues-scathing-rebuttal-to-casds-latest-statement","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/?p=5190","title":{"rendered":"D.A. issues scathing rebuttal to CASD\u2019s latest statement"},"content":{"rendered":"

Hogan directs sharpest criticism at district’s solicitor\u00a0<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

By Kathleen Brady Shea<\/strong>, Managing Editor, The Times<\/em><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\"Chester<\/a>

Chester County District Attorney Tom Hogan.<\/p><\/div>\n

The war of words between Chester County District Attorney Tom Hogan and the Coatesville Area School District school board escalated Saturday when Hogan ripped the board’s late-night Friday reply to his claim that the district was potentially impeding an ongoing investigation by his office.<\/p>\n

Hogan called the release \u201cclose to midnight on a Friday night,\u201d a metaphor for the board\u2019s approach to the case.\u00a0 \u201cThey are skulking in the dark, responding ineptly from the gloom, and making things worse for themselves and the entire school district,\u201d Hogan said.\u00a0 \u201cI have said it before and I will say it again – the children and taxpayers of the Coatesville Area School District deserve better.\u201d<\/p>\n

The latest round of testy exchanges between the two began after the school district issued a news release on Tuesday, April 1, stating that Assistant Superintendent Angelo Romaniello had been place on administrative leave, pending the outcome of an investigation by county, state and district investigators. Hogan responded with a news release taking issue with the district\u2019s suggestion that it had been cooperating with his investigators.\"\"<\/p>\n

Related Stories: CASD board emphatically denies D.A.\u2019s accusations<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 D.A. rips CASD, Ellison on investigation obstruction<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

That statement prompted another written statement from the board, which emphatically disputed those allegations. Hogan also stated that the situation that led to Romaniello\u2019s administrative leave had been reviewed and deemed non-criminal. The board\u2019s statement questioned why Hogan would suggest that the board had acted improperly. It maintained that it kept everyone, including its special counsel, Matthew Haverstick, informed after Board Member Deborah Thompson received information on March 27 from district employees Dr. Theresa Powell and Abdallah Hawa that led to the decision to place Romaniello on administrative leave.<\/p>\n

Haverstick did not return an email seeking comment.<\/p>\n

Although Powell and Hawa were the employees who exposed the text-messaging scandal that surfaced in September and led to the resignations of former Superintendent Richard Como and Coatesville Area High School Athletic Director James Donato, the board said the investigation of Romaniello was unrelated to that situation, which made national headlines and involved racially-charged texts on district phones issued to Como and Donato.<\/p>\n

The District Attorney\u2019s Office seized the phones in conjunction with a pre-existing investigation of the district, the results of which have not yet been made public. Tensions have percolated ever since. In October, Hogan also publicly accused the board and its solicitor of obstructing the ongoing criminal investigation, urging the board to appoint special counsel to avoid Solicitor James Ellison\u2019s apparent conflict of interest.<\/p>\n

In the Saturday statement, Hogan issued his sharpest criticism to date of Ellison. Although the Conrad O\u2019Brien firm was appointed and assigned Haverstick to oversee the investigation, Hogan said Ellison has excluded him from key communications.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe problem with the internal investigation of Romaniello is the involvement of CASB Solicitor James Ellison,\u201d Hogan wrote.\u00a0 \u201cEllison has a clear conflict of interest in being involved in any investigation of Romaniello.\u00a0 Ellison is being investigated by the D.A.’s Office.\u00a0 Romaniello is a witness in that investigation.\u00a0 Any first-year law student could identify that conflict and realize that Ellison must be removed from the investigation.\u201d<\/p>\n

Neither Ellison nor Board President J. Neil Campbell responded immediately to emails seeking comment.<\/p>\n

Further proof of Ellison\u2019s prominent role in the school board\u2019s actions is the fact that he continues to act as its spokesperson, Hogan said. \u201cIn fact, this most recent CASB press release sounds like it was drafted and orchestrated by Ellison, without ever checking in with special counsel,\u201d wrote Hogan.\u00a0 \u201cSpecial counsel exists to keep Ellison from being involved in the criminal investigation.\u00a0 But Ellison appears determined to\u00a0ignore prior warnings about staying out of this investigation.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hogan noted that the board\u2019s statement of Friday \u201ccompletely fails to address one of the main issues raised by the District Attorney’s Office: that certain board members are refusing to answer questions about Ellison’s conduct in this case.” Calling the board’s silence on this issue \u201cdeafening,\u201d Hogan wrote: \u201cIn failing to address this issue, the CASB response is revealed as an attempt to distract from their failure to cooperate.\u00a0 Furthermore, the CASB non-response is an admission that they are engaging in this course of conduct and have no intention to change their obstructive position\u2026If there is nothing to cover up, why not answer the questions about Ellison?\u201d<\/p>\n

During the initial investigation into the text-messaging, Hogan said Ellison brought in a technology company that locked Hawa, one of the whistle-blowers, out of the school district’s computer system.\u00a0 Ellison claimed that he was simply preserving evidence, Hogan said, adding that \u201cit has become clear that the technology company was instructed specifically to target the whistle-blower’s files, which has the appearance of interfering with the conduct of a cooperating witness, a continuing theme in this case.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hogan suggested that the public study \u201cthe big picture regarding Ellison\u201d in the case.\u00a0 \u201cCoatesville is the poorest school district in Chester County, with the highest taxes, and with the most diverse student body.\u00a0 From the public’s perspective, Ellison botched the board’s initial handling of the racist texts from Como and Donato,\u201d Hogan wrote.\u00a0 \u201cThen\u00a0the\u00a0District Attorney’s Office announced that Ellison was under investigation for potential over-billing of the school district.\u00a0 The media publicly reported that Ellison had billed the school district for millions of dollars over the years, in amounts that were wildly disproportionate\u00a0to the legal bills for\u00a0surrounding school districts.\u201d<\/p>\n

Media reports also indicated that Ellison \u201chad a separate ethics violation finding in an unrelated case,\u201d Hogan wrote.\u00a0 \u201cShortly after the announcement that Ellison was being investigated for over-billing, Ellison’s law firm, which has been cooperating in this investigation, parted ways with Ellison and announced that it would no longer represent the school district,\u201d Hogan wrote.<\/p>\n

Hogan said Ellison responded by raising \u201chis hourly billing rate from $180 per hour to $200 per hour\u201d and demanding to be re-hired by the board, which did exactly that. \u201cAll of this defies common sense,\u201d Hogan concluded.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Hogan directs sharpest criticism at district’s solicitor\u00a0 By Kathleen Brady Shea, Managing Editor, The Times The war of words between Chester County District Attorney Tom Hogan and the Coatesville Area School District school board escalated Saturday when Hogan ripped the board’s late-night Friday reply to his claim that the district was potentially impeding an ongoing […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5191,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,7],"tags":[3333,157,3347,3348,238,2620,3349,3350,3351],"class_list":["post-5190","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-featured","tag-assistant-superintendent-angelo-romaniello","tag-chester-county-district-attorneys-office","tag-coatesville-area-high-school-athletic-director-james-donato","tag-conrad-obrien","tag-district-attorney-tom-hogan","tag-former-superintendent-richard-como","tag-solicitor-james-ellison","tag-text-messaging-scandal","tag-the-coatesville-area-school-district-casd"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5190","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5190"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5190\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/5191"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5190"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5190"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chescotimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5190"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}