While the Attorney General has ruled the so-called “Ragosta Report” over how school administrators handed complaints about a former Gorton Junior High School is public information, it will be up …
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While the Attorney General has ruled the so-called “Ragosta Report” over how school administrators handed complaints about a former Gorton Junior High School is public information, it will be up to the School Committee what exactly is released.
In response to Access to Public Records Acts complaints filed by the Warwick Beacon and the Warwick Post, an online news service, against the committee last spring and then against the city last fall, Special Assistant Attorney General Lisa Pinsonneault in a March 2 ruling found “portions” of the report prepared by attorney Vincent Ragosta “must be disclosed.”
The questions now are who will release the report – the city or the School Committee – and what portions will be made public. City Solicitor Peter Ruggiero says that’s up to the committee.
“It’s their document,” Ruggiero said Thursday. “They’re to say yes on it.”
The committee is expected to address the issue tonight in executive session.
But the ruling also applies to the city and the City Council, which successfully subpoenaed to have the report released to them. Now that they have the report, and the attorney general has found portions of the report are public, aren’t they compelled to release it? In fact, the AG “directs that Warwick disclose” the reports within 20 business days of the finding.
“My position,” said Ruggiero, “is because they [the School Committee] paid for it, they should have the first decision on its release.”
The actions of the school administration came into question following the indictment of Gorton science teacher Mario Atoyan on March 23, 2015 on a charge of sexually assaulting a 15-year-old North Kingstown girl in 2014. When then superintendent Richard D’Agostino said Atoyan was a respected teacher, a Gorton parent released email complaints she had made that Atoyan had drawn a penis on her daughter’s arm while in school in 2013. Warwick Police investigated, but neither the mother nor a second parent who said Atoyan had done the same thing to her daughter and complained to the school administration, sought to press charges.
The School Committee pursued the matter, retaining Ragosta last April to investigate how the administration responded to the complaints about Atoyan. Ragosta verbally delivered that report in two executive School Committee meetings at which a stenographer was present. That transcript makes up the Ragosta report.
The Beacon made an APRA request for the report on July 14, followed by the Post’s request. The School Committee denied the requests on the basis that the report is an investigatory record and therefore not a public document.
But that didn’t end demand for the report.
The City Council subpoenaed the committee for the report, which the committee opposed in Superior Court, arguing that attorney/client provisions applied to the document. Judge Bennett Gallo ruled in December that the report be released to the council after sections of it relating to the students and matters pertaining to attorney/client privilege be redacted.
The Beacon and the Post then independently filed APRA requests for the document held by the council and the mayor. Those requests were denied.
In the finding, the attorney general cites the Beacon argument that the report is not an investigation of what Atoyan is accused of doing but rather how the school administration handled the complaint and whether policy or procedure was followed.
“You seek the reports that detail Warwick’s response to the underlying incident, rather than seek the portions of the reports that contain information relating to the underlying incident,” reads the finding. It goes on to say that Warwick made no effort to identify a statute that would prohibit such information from being made public.
In concluding that the city must respond to the request for access to records, the AG recognizes “the threat of litigation against Warwick, if Warwick decides to disclose the reports.” Nonetheless, the finding adds, “It is this department’s responsibility to ensure that any asserted rights are properly considered and reviewed.”
Both D’Agostino and Dennis Mullen, director of secondary education who Ragosta interviewed as part of his report, have since retired from the School Department. Rosemary Healey, who for many years served in the dual positions of director of human resources and legal counsel, was placed on paid leave last summer. Subsequently, the committee voted to fill the post of human resources, although Healey will remain on the payroll until her contract concludes in June of this year.
The committee’s legal counsel, Andrew Henneous, did not return a call for this story.
6 comments on this item Please log in to comment by clicking here
Justj1969
I really wish the "facts" presented were correct. I am the mother who was outraged by the administrations failure to take action. I sent and still have the email. Why did D'agastino retire and then apply to be superintendent of a different school district? WE the tax payers of Warwick paid for this report, not the school committee not the school administration. We as families of the children involved paid emotionally over the administrations actions. I know the facts because I've dealt with them for years now, so every time I read that we chose not to press charges makes me irate.. We were never given the option. We trusted that the administration would handle it properly, I expressed my opinion in my email as to how they had not. Mullen suggested I get a lawyer? To have my daughter safe at school? But yet they choose Jeff Taylor, the only school department member that acted to the extent of his authority as the scapegoat? I'm disgusted, if you have nothing to hide release the entire report.
Tuesday, March 8, 2016 Report this
JohnStark
The report should be made public in it's entirety with the name(s) of any children redacted, and let the chips fall where they may. The school committee is now in full stall mode, hoping that people will simply forget about this. This is a highly cynical approach, and one that fully captures their complete abdication of professional responsibility. Tragically, however, they are partly correct as people need to go about making a living and raising their families. Big debt of gratitude to Mr. Howell for staying on this. If someone wants to know why responsible parents are fleeing the Warwick public schools as fast as is humanly possible, they need only to read this article.
Tuesday, March 8, 2016 Report this
Justj1969
Johnstark, you are 100% correct I realize that the facts presented by Mr. Howell are the only ones he was given. The report if and when released without my name the other parents or the children will provide the proper information. The rug needs to be lifted and swept underneath. They requested the report, and in my opinion if it showed no fault on the administration it would have been released immediately. To spend more tax payer money fighting it's release is absurd. And beckons one to ask why?
Tuesday, March 8, 2016 Report this
smh
One only needs to know the last names of certain members of the School Committee, School Administration, City Council, Police Dept., General Assembly and the Attorney General's Office to connect the dots of this cover up..
Tuesday, March 8, 2016 Report this
JohnStark
bewildered: As someone who has followed this story but is not 'plugged in', I would appreciate it if you could connect the dots here. Is this a job for an investigative reporter at the projo...Channel 10?
Wednesday, March 9, 2016 Report this
richardcorrente
To all,
One thing we now know for sure...
The Ragosta Report is not, and never was "verbal".
It was and is a written report with written depositions typed by Allied Court Reporters just as I said it was.
Now, finally we need to correct this problem, and from here on in, can we please have "Total Transparency" as I have been calling for from the very beginning? The taxpayers deserve that! They are the ones paying the tab!
Thank you.
Richard Corrente
Democrat for Mayor
Wednesday, March 9, 2016 Report this