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Murder suspect no longer has school job

New York school board meeting minutes show David White was fired last month, despite his claim that he was still employed at the school where he worked before his arrest.

By THOMAS LAKE
Published July 20, 2006

But he no longer worked there on Wednesday, according to Geoffrey Hicks, the superintendent of the upstate New York school district that once employed him as a maintenance worker. School board records show his firing was approved last month.

White, a 38-year-old former New Port Richey resident, is accused of killing his wife, Andrea, in July 2005. After her death but before his arrest about 11 months later, he stayed at his sister's house in Wilson, N.Y., and worked for the Sweet Home Central School District in nearby Amherst.

"It's completely inappropriate," said Desiree Patton, who was Andrea White's best friend, of David White's employment on school grounds.

After more than a month in the Land O'Lakes jail, White posted $150,000 bail about two weeks ago and returned to New York.

"I already have a job," he said Friday. "I'm doing the same thing I was."

But according to meeting minutes posted on the district's Web site, the School Board approved White's termination June 20, three weeks after his arrest.

Hicks, the superintendent, would not say why White had been fired. He grilled a reporter about his credentials and refused to release any information until the reporter faxed him a photo ID and proof of employment on company letterhead. Even then, he remained tight-lipped on the matter.

So did School Board member Karen Barton.

"I have nothing else to add," she said. "I gotta go. I'm in the middle of something here, okay?"

White could not be reached for comment Wednesday. His sister Candace Redmond answered the phone at her house.

"My brother's wonderful," she said. "There's a lot of people up here that believe in my brother and they're so glad to see him back."

She added: "My brother has worked with children for a long time."

In an interview at her home in New Port Richey, Andrea White's friend Patton was asked what she would do if she learned David White was working at her children's school.

"I wouldn't let them go," she said. "Would you?"

Thomas Lake can be reached at tlake@sptimes.com or (727) 869-6245.

[Last modified July 20, 2006, 07:12:48]