Fired School Bus Driver Arrested, Charged With Battery

EVANSTON, IL — A 71-year-old school bus driver was fired and faces a criminal charge following a physical confrontation with a 9-year-old boy Friday afternoon in Evanston, according to police and school officials.

Students from Orrington Elementary School in Evanston/Skokie District 65, ranging from kindergarten to fifth grade, were on the way home when a driver from bus company Positive Connections stopped the bus around 4 p.m. in the area of the 1300 block of Foster Street, according to a police and a parent of two children on the bus.

The driver then walked to the back of the bus, picked up a fourth-grader and slammed him on the seat, according to the parent, citing one of her children's account.

A portion of the encounter that followed was recorded by a student using a cell phone and posted to social media, where it had been viewed more than a thousand times by Monday afternoon.

In the brief video, the driver appears to be struggling with a student in the back of the bus before the girl recording the scene can be heard warning that she would show the video to police.

David Rennie, 71, of the 4900 block of North Kenmore Avenue, Chicago, was arrested Tuesday and charged with one count of misdemeanor battery, according to Evanston Police Cmdr. Ryan Glew.

Glew said detectives reviewed surveillance video from the bus showing the driver shoving the student, lifting him up and forcing him down in a seat.

"A school bus driver grabbing a student and putting him down in a seat — that's not permitted," Glew said."You can't be grabbing a kid on a bus, picking them up and shoving them," absent some clear threat to student safety, he said. It was not clear what prompted the driver's actions.

District 65 Superintendent Paul Goren said administrators learned of the incident late Friday evening. On Saturday, Orrington Principal Jess Plaza told parents that "there was a reported interaction on Orrington Route 1 between the bus driver and a student, and we are currently investigating additional reports."

Plaza said the incident had been already reported to the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services and the Evanston Police Department. The Positive Connections bus company initially said the "substitute" driver had been removed from all routes in the district.

The parent whose children were on the bus told Patch she had complained to Positive Connections weeks ago about the driver, who she said had been transporting Orrington students since October. The parent said the driver had made rude and inappropriate comments to her daughter.

"That day I confronted him and I told him don't talk to my daughter like that. You can talk to me or my husband at the bus stop in the morning or you can talk to the school," she said. "So he proceeds to stick his middle finger up at me while kids were on the bus."

In a Monday message to District 65 families, Goren said he called a meeting with senior staff at the Positive Connections bus company Monday morning. He said the previous driver was terminated Saturday and a new driver has been assigned to the route. He said the company would hold a mandatory safety meeting for all drivers Tuesday.

"We reviewed the incident with the bus company and the driver was immediately terminated," Goren told Patch.

"We take matters that involve the safety and well-being of our students extremely seriously. Our team at Orrington is working directly with students to provide support in helping them to process their feelings around this incident," Goren said. "In addition, we are taking proactive steps and partnering with Positive Connections to ensure that travel to and from school is a safe, comfortable experience for every child who rides the bus."

Goren told parents Plaza rode the Orrington Route 1 bus Monday and Lou Gatta, the district's director of transportation services, would ride that and other bus routes randomly in the coming weeks.

A representative of Positive Connections, a division of New Jersey-based Student Transportation Inc., did not respond to a request for comment about the incident Tuesday.