Past Letters:Letters Sent by the SVHS LSIC April 2008April 1, 2008Mr. Steve Morris, Principal
Spring Valley High School
Wayne County Schools
#1 Timberwolf Drive
Huntington, WV 25704
Dear Mr. Morris:
You are well aware of the multiple complaints weekly, sometimes daily, received as regards Mr. Todd Thompson’s actions, inaction, and interaction with students, parents, faculty and staff at your school.
It has come to my attention that Mr. Thompson has taken photos of SVHS students, minors, without your authorization, without parental consent or signed permission, retained said photographic images, removed them from school premises, published them to the internet on a private website, utilizing a private, non-academic internet service provider.
As administrator of Spring Valley High School, you may move, remove, and re-distribute county-purchased assets within your facility as you deem necessary and are expected to attend to daily safety and security matters as regards your facility as you deem necessary.
Therefore, the LSIC requests that you immediately remove all computer equipment, external hard drives, digital storage media, flash drives, all video cameras and equipment, and all other cameras, both digital and film-based, and any other items found in or in the vicinity of Mr. Todd Thompson’s office at Spring Valley High School and secure them until such time as they can be examined as relates to inappropriate actions involving the above-mentioned minor children.
We also request the locks for the office, server room, and related common areas such as the library be changed or secured until the area itself can be closely examined as regards images stored on network drives or other computers.
The LSIC will also request, via the Wayne County Board of Education, the return of any images personally retained my Mr. Thompson at other private locations immediately.
Thank you for your cooperation,
Karen Rucker, Chair
Spring Valley High School
Local School Improvement Committee
April 10, 2008Gentlemen:
The LSIC of Spring Valley High School is very concerned about daily functionality issues regarding the SVHS network, computer labs, the library/media center computers, technology class labs, the laptop lab, classroom/faculty computers and the Channel 39 computer and uplink, among other things.
The daily maintenance, updates & back-ups, scheduling, (daily) Netware student record maintenance, multiple software management, assessment & troubleshooting, on-site problem resolution, hardware assessment & prompt submission of work orders that occur every day in a school that need the attention of a system operator/network administrator have not been addressed for some time at SVHS.
The proper functioning of the network and related computer equipment is essential to every single student, every day at SVHS, not to mention the administration, faculty and staff.
The LSIC learned on Friday, April 4th, that the former Network Administrator at SVHS, Sean Ferguson, is available for outside contract work.
The members of the LSIC request that Mr. Ferguson be employed as an outside contractor to fill this short-term but critical need for a specifically skilled individual to deal with the above-mentioned issues in Mr. Thompson’s absence.
We feel Mr. Ferguson to be a logical and practical choice during this period, due to his previous experience on site. Because of his familiarity with Novell Netware and the installations at SVHS, little time would be lost and no additional expense incurred during transition as might happen if someone unfamiliar with the school and its applications were employed and they required extra time or training to perform the relevant job duties.
Mr. Ferguson’s home phone number is 733-4185. The office personnel at SVHS have additional contact information for him, if needed.
Thank you for your prompt attention as regards this matter.
Karen Rucker, Chair
SVHS Local School Improvement Committee
April 10, 2008
Gentlemen:
It has come to our attention that an email sent on Wednesday, February 6th, 2008 by Todd Thompson was irrational and threatening, clearly indicating a possible threat to Spring Valley High School and its students, in general, and also to certain administrative staff, specifically named therein.
[Note: This email was sent from an access email account to multiple email addresses, including at least one access email account of a WCBOE Central Office staff member via the WVDE access email network/WVNET.]
In this rambling, irrational, threatening five-page email:
Please note: (sic) All misspellings are intended, enclosed in quotation marks as direct quotes and relevant to a verbatim transcription.
Mr. Thompson uses the words “violate/violation of my rights or my civil rights” eight times.
Mr. Thompson uses the word “defend” (as to myself or my rights) three times
Mr. Thompson refers to the United States Constitution five times.
Mr. Thompson refers to Freedom of Religion or religious beliefs five times.
Mr. Thompson uses the word “hair” fourteen times.
Mr. Thompson uses the word “they” sixteen times.
Mr. Thompson uses several hot-button phrases such as “until I draw my last breath” “stand up and defend myself” “Facist state” “BLATANT violation of my civil rights” “unreasonable search and siesure” “reached the end of my rope” “I will do what ever is necessary to maintain my right” “I have taken every kind of medication in the world”
Mr. Thompson singles out SVHS administrators Mr. Morris, Mr. Davis, Mr. Swann, and secretary, Cosbie Farley by name and refers to them two more times as the “4 of them”. It further mentions the administrators as the three of them or the other two at least two more times and then singles out Mr. Morris a third time by name, saying “his cupability (sic) is like double or tripple (sic) that of the other two.” Did law enforcement, assuming they reviewed this, construe this to be a de facto ‘hit list’?
Other items of interest:
“talked to 2 other employees who have long hair” – Were those 2 employees (witnesses) interviewed
as to their opinion as to state of mind/premeditation
of action, drugs?
“My desk has been searched and researched many times” - Why? When? By whom? What were the
results?
“I have taken every kind of medication in the world” – Intemperate condition in workplace/Drug-Free
Schools/Workplace documents? What drugs?
Drug test? Self medicate? Prescrips obtained
illegally, pot, crack, cocaine, meth? Appearance,
strange odors, strange nonsensical statements,
aggressiveness, particularly toward students,
loss of sense of time while in main office, loss of
fine-motor skills noted in workplace, seen
lounging/sitting on loading dock/custodial area at
rear of school, after school, smoking,
appeared to be an altered state
Rants that are particularly alarming:
“But I am still ready to defend myself.”
“Are we quietly turning into a Facist state, where the bosses tell the little people what to do”
“I will do what ever is necessary to maintain my right”
“better not be bullying me, because I am on guard and will defend my rights under the Constitution, until I draw my last breath. I stand before you now not as just another person to be punted around for their glee and sick pleasure, so they can chuckle when I am dismissed from the room, but you see before you an American proud and strong, from Wayne County, who will stand up and defend myself against tyranny and deep seated long standing traditions that need to be changed because they are wrong and in conflict with the US Constitution”
“I am the only 1 who is being picked on, and that is blatant discrimination and creating a nonlevel playing field with forethought and malice”
“wrong, especially when done over months of time with great forethought and deepseated malice”
“and there fore we will pick on you, bedevil you, change your access level to the server, make you look like a fool, do just what ever we can think of to get you to cut your hair because we think it is wrong, or OUR pastor told us that it is wrong, and we need to straighten you out boy.”
“My desk has been searched and researched many times, this is a violation, of unreasonable search and siesure by the state.”
“Shall I go on how over the past few years that I have been singled out for discrimination and violation of my civil rights?”
…“And for their sakes, they should quit violating my civil rights.”
“… my main boss Mr. Morris … so his cupability is like double or tripple that of the other two.’
Note: Transition from multi-page third paragraph rant portion of email to last five paragraphs (which were short, non-descript, conversational, pleasant) was decidedly odd, abrupt, like switch flipping. No mention or acknowledgement of previous rantings, revelations, disclosures or issues discussed in the lengthy, single-spaced third paragraph diatribe, that when printed, prints to approximately 3 full pages.
The members of the LSIC are gravely concerned about this email.
The email was sent on February 6, 2008.
Items of concern as relates to the timeframe of receipt of this email:
On February 7, 2008, an adult entered Notre Dame Elementary School, in nearby Portsmouth, Ohio, armed with a handgun and knife, and attempted to kill an employee in front of a classroom of children. This individual had previously made written and verbal irrational, threatening statements and exhibited irrational, aggressive behavior prior to said act.
On February 14, 2008, an adult (medicated, highly educated, had been attending college for ten years) entered a Northern Illinois University lecture hall with three handguns and a shotgun and killed five, injured sixteen. This individual had previously made written and verbal irrational, threatening statements and exhibited irrational, aggressive behavior prior to said act. The shooter also made gun-related purchases before the shootings.
Note: It was found that the Northern Illinois shooter purchased weapons online from the
same vendor that the Virginia Tech shooter purchased weapons from.
http://edition.cnn.com/2008/US/02/15/university.shooting/index.htmlNote: The Virginia Tech shooter was a medicated, highly-educated adult who
had previously made written and verbal irrational, threatening statements and
exhibited irrational, aggressive behavior. The shooter also made gun-related
purchases before the shootings.
Item of concern as relates to investigation and remedies as relates to receipt of this email:
Less than a week after the October 10, 2007 shootings at SuccessTech Academy High School, located in Cleveland Ohio, by a student who was previously known by administrators to be a threat, the Cleveland Public School District established a hotline for students to report threats and dangerous behavior, announced it was hiring armed security guards to patrol all campuses, installing metal detectors at all schools, and implementing additional security precautions at all schools to be reviewed by an outside professional security firm.
The members of the LSIC are gravely concerned about this email.
Even to the untrained eye, the writer of this email seems to have a skewed perception of reality, a problem with perspective as regards routine everyday comments or occurrences, and feels very persecuted. The email seems to indicate the writer appears to be deeply paranoid and terribly over-reactive, obsessed with hair, obsessed with protecting or avenging perceived rights against perceived attacks or infringements or offenses, and also seems to be immersed in defensive, ultra-right-wing, Constitutionalist rhetoric.
The members of the LSIC are gravely concerned about this email.
Please document the date, manner of, and results of the investigation regarding this email.
- Who assessed the threat level and profiled this email as to drug use, mental state, propensity to violence and criminal intent?
- What law enforcement agency/agencies was this email forwarded to for review and assessment? On what date(s)?
- Was a multi-state background check performed on Mr. Thompson to learn if he had any undisclosed citations, arrests, convictions, warrants? When?
- Were database checks performed to learn if Mr. Thompson has been buying weapons within the last 12 – 24 months? When?
- When was this email forwarded to the WCBOE’s attorney? Did he render any opinion regarding action required? Was the opinion followed?
- When was the WVDE informed of the inappropriate access email transmission via WVNET?
- What is/was their (the WVDE) position/participation in this matter?
- When was the principal of SVHS informed about the email? A copy of that letter would be helpful.
- When were the two SVHS employees with long hair interviewed? Did they express fear or concern? Was it considered that either of these two individuals could be Mr. Thompson’s drug connection/customers? Was that investigated?
- When were the SVHS administrators and secretary who were personally named in the email warned of the threat? A copy of that letter would be helpful.
- What extra measures were taken at the school to ensure student, faculty & staff safety?
- Was Mr. Thompson tested for drug use? When?
- Why was Mr. Thompson not suspended at this time?
We appreciate your prompt and complete response as regards this urgent situation.
The fourteen bulleted areas above represent questions regarding procedure and remedy. We are very interested in the actions of Central Office administrative personnel and the WCBOE, assuming the board members reviewed said email and were fully apprised of all related activities following its receipt by Central Office staff.
You will note we do not ask any questions which could be avoided by utilizing the “it’s a personnel matter and cannot be discussed” answer. Particularly, we do not inquire about what opinion the attorney rendered, only if one was rendered and if it was followed. We do not inquire as to the results of any drug test regarding specific personnel; we ask only if the procedures followed included a request and compliance for testing. Obviously, the Board did not suspend Mr. Thompson, so it is certainly reasonable to inquire as to justification for that decision.
Once again, we appreciate your prompt and complete response as regards this urgent situation.
Sincerely,
Karen Rucker, Chair
Spring Valley High School
Local School Improvement Committee
April 15, 2008
Gentlemen:
The LSIC of Spring Valley High School is very concerned as regards the matter that was brought before you during Executive Session at the April 1, 2008 Board of Education meeting.
We have received no communication from you these past two weeks as regards this urgent matter.
The parents of many children at SVHS are very concerned. They wish to know if the images of their children that were at Mr. Thompson’s private residence and on various electronic or photographic equipment at his private residence or elsewhere other than school grounds have been recovered and are in your possession.
When was this equipment seized? When will the parents be notified of the recovery of these images?
Also, we are concerned as regards written threats found in Mr. Thompson’s office with specific children’s names attached. Have the police determined this to be a possible “de facto” hit list? With this new threat, we request all exterior locks at SVHS be changed.
The LSIC would like to be informed as to the progress of these multiple investigations.
Sincerely,
Karen Rucker, Chair
SVHS LSIC
Letters Received by the SVHS LSIC
This is a copy of a letter given to the SVHS LSIC when the LSIC requested proof that a frightened student's complaint made to a member of the SVHS LSIC about Mr. Todd Thompson's abusive physical and verbal behavior towards her and another student had been addressed properly.
April 4, 2008
Gary Adkins, Supt. of Schools
Central Office
P.O. Box 70
Wayne, WV 25570
Mr. Adkins,
We have identified another situation regarding items in Mr. Todd Thompson’s office as regards his contact with Spring Valley High School students.
A female student had previously complained anonymously to a secretary who is an LSIC member about Mr. Thompson’s verbal abuse and actions toward her and another student but was too frightened to sign a written complaint. She also stated she wanted to start a petition to have him removed from our school but again was too frightened.
Since Mr. Thompson’s absence, she handed in a written statement but was still too frightened to sign it. I added this statement to the large file of complaints which I have kept on Mr. Thompson.
Today, I realized that an angry, threatening message written by Mr. Thompson on the back of a magazine I noticed laying in his office, referred to this child and another student by name.
I wanted you to be aware of this new information.
Sincerely,
Steve Morris, Principal
Spring Valley High School
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