Teacher fired over sex offense

Pinellas School Board members wrestle with the district's policy and split in their vote over misdemeanor charges.

By KELLY RYAN GILMER, Times Staff Writer
© St. Petersburg Times
published March 13, 2002

LARGO -- A divided School Board voted Tuesday to fire a veteran middle school teacher arrested on sex charges in 1999.

Reginald K. Reese, a respected dropout prevention teacher at Riviera Middle School in St. Petersburg, is expected to appeal. His attorney, Mark Herdman, said the district's policy is unconstitutional because it denied Reese due process.

Under district policy, anyone charged with a sexual offense is automatically fired, and an administrative law judge recently said the board can follow its policy.

On Tuesday, School Board members wrestled with the policy's restrictions. Several said Reese's firing didn't fit the crime.

Board members Lee Benjamin, Max Gessner, Tom Todd and Nancy Bostock voted to fire Reese; Linda Lerner, Jane Gallucci and Carol Cook voted against it. Board members also agreed to study their employee and student discipline policies at a future workshop.

"Should one mistake, a serious mistake, in an exemplary teacher's life wipe out his career in Pinellas County?" asked Lerner, who called the current policy misguided. "My answer is, clearly, no."

Reese was arrested Nov. 10, 1999, in a public beach area on Fourth Street N off 116th Avenue. Undercover deputies said they saw Reese and two men, whom Reese didn't know, engaged in consensual sex. He was charged with exposure of sexual organs and lascivious acts, both misdemeanors.

His attorney advised him not to report it to district officials, which the district requires. Reese pleaded no contest to the charges, paid a fine, and adjudication was withheld. He successfully petitioned to have his criminal record sealed.

The district learned of Reese's arrest two years later when he tried to renew his teaching certificate. Superintendent Howard Hinesley moved to fire Reese, who appealed. An administrative law judge acknowledged that Reese was a good teacher but said the board could follow its policy.

Herdman argued that the district should have a policy that allows elected School Board members to exercise their judgment about the facts of a case.

"We need to have a little inconsistency because different circumstances deserve different results," Herdman said.

Some board members who voted to fire Reese said they are bound to follow district policy. Others said Reese's actions were unacceptable.

"We want to be fair. We want to be consistent," Benjamin said. "How do students, how do teachers know where they stand if we don't have a policy that says what's proper? If you don't have a policy, a framework, you're going to have chaos."

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