Concord School Board To Update Public About Investigation Tuesday

CONCORD, NH — Tuesday's monthly Concord Board of Education meeting has been moved to a larger school facility in an effort to accommodate parents expected to show up and continue their call for the removal of the district's superintendent and high school principal. The board's regular monthly meeting, which is scheduled for 7 p.m. on Sept. 3, was moved from the SAU 8 office on Liberty Street to the Mill Brook Primary School at 53 S. Curtisville Road. At the meeting, the board is expected to give the public an update on an internal investigation into the handling of inappropriate relationship allegations against Primo "Howie" Leung with two students that led to the Concord High School teacher being arrested on rape and fondling charges in Massachusetts.

While no specific information was offered in the board packet, it is listed as an agenda item.

Stephen Bennett of Wadleigh, Starr & Peters PLLC was hired by the district to serve as a liaison between Djuna Perkins of DP Law, a former prosecutor from Massachusetts, and the board. Bennett has been counsel for the city of Nashua for nearly two decades and has worked with other municipalities and school boards, according to the firm's website. Perkins, who is conducting the investigation, has tried "countless cases" in courts in the Bay State and served as an assistant district attorney in Suffolk County, where she was chief of the domestic violence unit, her bio stated.

School officials previously expected the investigation to be completed by mid-July but that has been pushed back to sometime later this month. The district released a revamped student and employee standards "expectations policy" last month.

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Parents Group Reacts To Apology

The meeting change location as well as an Americans With Disabilities Act accessibility request for parents with hearing impairments were made by CSD Advocates for Change, the group of parents that started an online petition last month, calling for the removal of Superintendent Terri Forsten and Tom Sica, the principal of Concord High School.

The petition has garnered nearly 2,750 signatures in less than two weeks.

The org requested the change because it was concerned about the inability of the board's Central Office meeting space to accommodate parents and community members interested in attending or them hearing the comments of those attending, according to an email forwarded to Patch by the org.

The request was made on Friday afternoon a few hours after school officials informed the press and the public that the meeting would be held at the Central Office. Officials appear to have accommodated the request, since the meeting location was changed and posted on the department's website Saturday. New Hampshire's open meeting law requires boards to give at least 24 hour notification for the posting of meetings, Monday through Saturday. Neither the district nor the board or its members communicated with Patch or the group about the meeting location change though.

The group created the petition after Forsten lashed out in an internal memo to staff about the media coverage in the wake of the Leung arrest, the revelation that allegations against him were made as far back as 2014, and that a student at Rundlett Middle School at the time, Ana Goble, was suspended for spreading "malicious and slanderous gossip," by raising concerns about the teacher's relationships with girls. The revelation of the 2014 accusation led to Sica taking a leave of absence as well as a financial settlement with Goble's family.

Forsten, in a letter last week to parents and staff, apologized for her remarks. However, CSD Advocates for Change said the apology was too little, too late.

"An apology letter will not change the fact that (so many) people have signed our petition declaring no confidence in the current superintendent," said Darlene Gildersleeve, a founding member and media contact for the organization. "The will of the public is new leadership that will foster a positive school culture where students, teachers and families feel safe and supported. No one should fear retaliation from leadership. The public has spoken. Now we look to the school board members, employers of the superintendent, to act."

The org is also asking parents to wear royal blue at the meeting Tuesday.

Analysis: What Should The Investigation Show?

While specifics of the investigation are not available, the public, including parents, teachers, and taxpayers, as well as the press, should expect a certain amount of information to be explored and revealed from the district's internal investigation into the Leung arrest and the handling of the allegations against him.

First and foremost is how, it appears, Leung was able to escape any type of oversight between the time he was named a distinguished educator at the end of the 2012 school year to the point where students came forward with accusations that he was seen hugging and kissing a student in a car parked at a red light in December 2018, on East Side Drive and I-393, not far from his home.

Interviews, hoping that key players in the investigation tell Perkins the truth, will not be enough; emails, employment files, and phone records should all be examined.

If they don't already have it, the district's leadership as well as board of education members need to have access to (so they can examine) investigatory files against Leung compiled by the district, the New Hampshire Department of Education, the Concord Police Department, and the Middlesex County District Attorney's Office in Massachusetts. It's all going to come out in a Massachusetts courtroom, at some point, wouldn't it be good to know about what is in there now?

Another aspect of the investigation that needs to be explored is how Sica determined that Goble's concerns were gossip and rumors in the first place. What investigatory tactics did he use to come to this conclusion – one that blindsided Goble and her family? Who did he speak with about it other than Goble? Did previous administrators at SAU 8 know about this case? What, if anything, did anyone do to rectify these concerns before a second student accusation?

During the investigation into Leung and the claim of inappropriate relations with the second student, both the teacher and the student denied anything inappropriate occurred, according to the investigation by CHS Vice Principal Steve Rothenberg.

But Rothenberg also raised "areas of concern" that were "not fully developed" in his report.

Those included the accusation of a long relationship with the second student dating back to Rundlett as well as the recruitment of Concord students to participate Fessenden School ELL summer program in Newton, Massachusetts, that Leung oversaw and where the first assaults allegedly occurred.

Another was why and how the Save Our Cold Kids program had become an almost exclusively female student organization?

Then there is the accusation that Leung deleted photos. Would the deletion of photos, in a felony rape and fondling case, be cause for a felony falsifying physical evidence charge in New Hampshire, at some point?

All along the way, teachers also raised concerns about student boundaries. And yet no one seemed to have said a word about any of this. How is this possible? It's not believable.

These concerns as well as the "professional improvement plan" set up for Leung led Forsten to go to the NH DOE for a second opinion in the first place while Leung was kept on as an educator for months.

Were there any other warning signs along the way? What levels of complaints or concerns were raised against Leung during those five and a half years?

The internal investigation should also look into how and why Leung was transferred to Concord High School and what role, if any, Sica or past administrators played in that change, too.

Got a news tip? Send it to Tony Schinella at tony.schinella@patch.com.

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