Crime & Safety

Teachers, Aides Harbored Suspicions About Teacher

In interviews with police, teachers and paraprofessionals here long believed something was amiss between Christine Powell and one of her students, but they never reported it to law enforcement. Powell is charged with sexually assaulting the boy.

 

At least a year before police arrested a on charges she had sex with one of her teenage students, other teachers and paraprofessionals in the district had significant concerns about .

Those concerns and suspicions were strong enough that one paraprofessional quit over what she felt was an inappropriate relationship between Powell and the boy, who at the time was in middle school, and another raised concerns about the situation, at least twice, with an administrator.

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School leaders warned Powell, 39, not to be alone with the boy, but the admonition had no impact. Powell would later admit to police to having sex with the 16-year-old on a regular basis, as often as several times a week, over the course of about seven months.

That’s the scenario laid out in the affidavit that police used to secure Powell’s arrest last month.

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Despite a state law that identifies teachers, administrators and paraprofessionals as “mandated reporters” of suspected child abuse, and despite at least a half-dozen teachers and aides who harbored suspicions and concerns about Powell and the boy, the warrant indicates that no one in the school district alerted police or state child welfare officials that there was a problem.

The law states that “mandated reporters are required to report or cause a report to be made when, in the ordinary course of their employment or profession, they have reasonable cause to suspect or believe that a child under the age of 18 has been abused, neglected or is placed in imminent risk of serious harm. Mandated reporters must report orally to the Department of Children and Families' Hotline or a law enforcement agency within 12 hours of suspecting that a child has been abused or neglected and must submit a written report … to DCF within 48 hours of making the oral report.”

It was the boy’s mother who eventually went to police in late November of 2011, after her son had been in a relationship with Powell for many months and after the boy had spent a weekend with her.

Most of the teachers and teacher aides who would later tell police they thought something was amiss with Powell never even brought their concerns to their bosses, the warrant shows. Some went directly to Powell to warn her that she was treading on dangerous ground with the boy, warnings she brushed off, the arrest warrant states.

Despite the standing order that Powell wasn’t to be alone with the boy, one teacher, David Munoz, saw Powell in a locked classroom with the teen when he was a student at Woodrow Wilson Middle School, where Powell also taught. Munoz never brought the situation to the attention of his bosses, a decision he told police he later regretted.

“Munoz said that he was concerned about Powell and the victim,” the arrest affidavit states. “He said he was very glad I was investigating this and he felt bad that he didn’t do more when he was first aware that something was not right.”

Numerous other teachers and aides had similar misgivings. Just two of them, the warrant indicates, brought the issue to the attention of someone in authority in the district. Sometime prior to Powell being suspended in November a teacher at the middle school, Emily Asklar, approached the Board of Education’s chairman, Gene Nocera, after seeing Powell and the boy alone in a car near one of the schools. Asklar was aware that Powell was not supposed to be alone with the boy.

Nocera had been principal of the middle school during the time the victim was Powell’s student there, but he retired in June 2010 and took an administrative job in Bristol.

There is no indication in the warrant that Nocera brought Asklar’s concerns to school administrators.

The affadavit says, "one day during the current school year," Asklar saw Powell and the victim in her car. "She reported it to Gene Nocera, who was principal of the school the year that the victim was Powell's student."

Asklar's statement seems to contradict the one Nocera gave police. Reached by phone, Nocera said his statement to police was correct. "I haven't spoken with [Asklar] since 2010." He also confirmed that he had never spoken with Asklar while he was chairman of the Board of Education, a post he was elected to last November.

In 2010 Asklar spoke with Nocera about Powell and the victim. In an interview with police, Nocera said that while he was principal of the middle school, Asklar twice approached him with her misgivings about Powell's relationship with her male student.

In the affadavit, Nocera said, he warned Powell that she could not be alone with the victim. He told police he “followed up” on his warning to Powell and that “it appeared as if Powell was following his directive.”

In reality, Powell’s relationship with the boy was deepening. When the boy left middle school for the high school, Powell got a job there.

When police began to investigate in November of last year, teachers and aides shared their concerns and suspicions. One told police that two summers ago she saw the boy hanging out at Powell’s home, swimming in her pool and that, wearing a bikini, Powell joined him. Others reported to police that they saw the boy hug Powell and smell her hair in the school. One said they overheard what appeared to be a spat between the two in the high school hallway. Another said she quit working as an aide at the middle school when she became uncomfortable with the relationship between the two. Still others saw Powell giving the boy rides around town in her car.

One administrator, Colleen Weiner, the high school's assistant principal, told police she was aware that some teachers at the school had concerns about Powell.

When confronted by police in November, Powell admitted that she and the boy began having sex in April of 2011, just after he turned 16. She said they would meet regularly for sex — weekly during the school year, more often during the summer — at her house.

“She said that their relationship was more than about sex,” the affidavit states. “She said that they truly loved each other and that they planned on moving out of state together after the victim turned 18.”

Powell was arrested in February and charged with sexual assault. She has pleaded not guilty. She will reappear in Middletown Superior Court on March 20 and she is being held on a $150,000 bail.

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