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Staff members allege student 'touched wrong'
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Several staff members at Rice Lake's Tainter Elementary School recently gave statements to law enforcement that they felt a fellow teacher's touching of a 10-year-old male student was inappropriate, leading to the fifth-grade instructor's arrest.
David M. Suino, 47, of Rice Lake was charged Tuesday with one count of misdemeanor disorderly conduct, after being arrested and booked the day before. The maximum penalty for the offense includes 90 days of incarceration and $1,000 in fines.
According to the criminal complaint, three of the school's staff members spoke to police about the alleged teacher-student contact.
One school aide, Carol Curtis, told authorities that she became uncomfortable with Suino's behavior toward a 10-year-old male student beginning the week of Sept. 17. On several occasions since then, Curtis said she saw the fifth-grade teacher holding the boy's hands, hugging the child, rubbing the student's hands and the 10-year-old's bare stomach.
Jean Videen, another school aide at Tainter Elementary, gave statements to police that Suino and the same student were in the back of Suino's classroom when she walked in Sept. 27. She alleged that the fifth-grade teacher and the boy were squatting next to each other, and Suino was rubbing the boy's back both on top of, and then underneath, the child's shirt. Suino then put his hand between the child's legs, but Videen said she couldn't see where it went exactly. The aide also reported that about one week before that incident, she saw the fifth-grade teacher standing close behind the 10-year-old at the blackboard where Suino had one arm on the blackboard and the other on the boy's back.
Special education instructor Eric Hallingstad also reported touching between the boy and his fifth-grade teacher to police. Hallingstad alleged that he witnessed Suino with his hand up from the knee area underneath the boy's shorts. Hallingstad added that the fifth-grade teacher's hand was closer to the boy's knee than his private area.
The 10-year-old student acknowledged the contact when questioned by police, but he said he does not consider it "a bad touch," according to the complaint. The child also said that the teacher never touched his private area.
Authorities then spoke with Suino about the allegations. Suino said he rubs kids' backs over their shirts in a display of support. When questioned about beneath the shirt contact, the teacher allegedly said he couldn't recall doing that, but if he did it just happens and he's unaware of it.
The case remains under investigation. The Rice lake Area School District is cooperating with the effort, according to a press release from the Rice Lake Police Department.
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©Barron News Shield 2009
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