Mariposa_Xochipilli's Blog

Congratulations to the county prosecutor for having the courage to hold the Jordan School District to the laws the rest of us live by. Heaven knows the district has taken every opportunity to manipulate the District Attorney's office. Maybe it's time for consequences for district arrogance. The Attorney General doesn't feel it's his job to hold them accountable; he said so in writing and on the news.

School administrators aren't police; they aren't trained in how to investigate. That's the job of either Child Protective Services or the police. Where's the benefit in identifying a situation that shows there are problems and opens the district to the scrutiny of being held accountable?

How many children had their innocence torn from them because the Jordan School District allowed it's staff to conduct investigations on themselves and their subordinates? How many children became victims of this 'Teacher of the Year'?

This district is so far above the law and out of touch with reality that they can get away with refusing to provide doctor ordered accommodations in school for no reason other than the school feels meeting that child's established medical needs would create a difficult situation for the school. Any one of us who did that would, rightfully, be charged and prosecuted for criminal neglect of a minor ... a disabled minor.

How dare the Jordan School District abuse their authority to the detriment of the children in their care! How dare they compromise the integrity of the profession!

I have legally obtained district documentation proving how they abuse the court system, alter official documentation in their favor and refuse to meet the medical needs of disabled students ... if anyone would like to see it.

Is there anyone who is above being held accountable under the law? If there is, there are a few laws that needs to be changed ... a few 'sacred cows' that are infected with mad cow disease.

Let me set up a few parameters for this discussion. A 'goal' is the purpose for which a person takes action. 'Intent' is the means by which the goal is attained. I looked it up in the dictionary.

To relieve themselves of being held accountable, an educational wrongdoer hiding behind their position of public trust need only identify their 'goal' as meaning their 'intent' ... two very different concepts. The public and the media all too often take an educational professional at their word without verifying facts. It's the only time media freely makes that mistake. They wouldn't want to be considered anti-education ... which is how school districts misrepresent and discredit anyone who tries to hold them accountable under the laws of this great nation.

That wasn't my intention' ... yes it was if the actions taken meant the goal was acheived. Their goal might be to intimidate parents into forfeiting protections under the law ... but their intent is to accomplish that via whatever means are at their disposal. Defaming a person's character and detroying a person's good name are ways school districts 'intentionally' acheive their goal of not having to be held accountable under the law.

The current form of what started out as the Espionage Act of 1917 (18USC2388) states in part ...

(a) "Whoever when the United States is at war, willfully makes or conveys false reports or false statements with the intent to interfere with the operation or the success of the military or naval forces of the United States ... or,

Whoever, when the United States is at war, willfully causes or attempts to cause insubordination, disloyalty, mutiny or refusal of duty, in the military or naval forces of the United States ...

Shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than twenty years, or both.

(b) If two or more persons conspire to violate subsection (a) of this section and one or more of such persons do act to affect the object of this conspiracy, each of the parties to such conspiracy shall shall be punished as provided in said subsection (a)."

Subsection (c) deals with concealing someone or that someone has violated this law, with the punishment of a fine, ten years imprisonment, or both.

Subsection (d) establishes the validity of the law under maritime situations.

An admistrator with the Jordan School District initiated an action which caused my husband to need to refuse duty in Kuwait after 9/11. Do you know what it was like telling the Commander, who called our home from the field, that he would not be getting his communications sergeant back ... or the effect that loss had on the mission and the soldiers left behind?

This same administrator was told in a taped meeting that my husband would lose both his military jobs (our only sources of income) if he had to refuse deployment and return home. The following month we met with this person and the school principal to spell out the negative effect the district doing that again would have on the success of the mission and the safety of the soldiers. The two administrators waited until two days after it had been covered on the news that the unit deployed, thinking my husband had already left, arranged for me to be at school and told the resource officer I was there criminally trespassing. They knew my husband would have to refuse duty in Afghanistan to return home. Besides violation of 18USC2388, this would be entrapment ... a crime, not educational intervention as they claim.

Their goal might have been to intimidate and bully me into forfeiting my rights, but their intent was to accomplish that by willfully attempting to cause refusal of duty in time of war.

These same two adminstrators then fabricated, altered and manipulated documentation ... making and conveying false statements ... so they could have malicious criminal charges their own documentation proved were bogus filed and pursued at taxpayer expense knowing that if my husband received orders to join his unit, he would have to refuse duty.

To further willfully attempt to cause refusal of duty should he be called, the first administrator instructed a subordinate to write a letter containing false statements that would have put me out of compliance with a plea in abeyance she was lead to believe I was going to accept. Another subordinate documented that the letter was written on the day the plea was offered (five months after the alleged offense had been committed) and that the letter was held for additional weeks until the date on which I was supposed to have accepted the offered plea. With me wrongfully imprisoned for contempt of court - since courts and media professionals never independently check information school districts give them to see if districts are conveying false reports, my husband would immediately be have been caused to refuse duty.

I wish I knew how to post those, and other, documents. The district might be bound by privacy laws, but FERPA puts no such restrictions on parents (or anyone else, including media) who legally access the files.

And it would be nice if the State's top cop, Attorney General Mark Shurtleff, hadn't been willing to abdicate his responsibilities to the citizens of Utah who elected him by writing a letter that stated it isn't his job to investigate allegations of wrongdoing by school districts.

But then, it would also be nice if Jordan School District's compliance officer and superintendent wouldn't enable their peers to hide behind positions of public trust with the school district and investigate when a parent brings them documents and allegations of wrongdoing.

Isn't that why the principal from the school that had the pedophile teacher is under charges and being defended by an attorney that is being paid with money given by the legislature to go to students in classrooms?

It seems as if the few corrupt members of the Jordan School District hiding behind their district positions are above the law no matter which way you turn ... parents who  have to take on the oversight roles intended for the USOE and AG are NOT the ones who are anti-education in this scenario.

The statute of limitations for violation of 18USC2388  is ten years. That leaves six years in which justice can be served and at least the one person most responsible can be held accountable.

Is faith God's domain alone?

If a person believes, supports and has faith in the inherent goodness of others, does their not having been convinced there is an omnipotent deity invalidate/diminish that faith?

What makes an issue positive or negative?

If we hear something we don't agree with or that challenges the status quo, does that automatically mean it is negative?

One person can think chocolate is a positive thing. A person who is allergic to the cacao bean would not likely be able to share the same opinion. Does that mean the person with the allergy is being negative?

Let's consider the Olympics ... there are those who think that Bejing was a bad choice and that boycotting the games would be a positive thing. Many athletes for whom this is their one chance to fulfill a life long dream might consider a boycott to be negative.

People thought the Berlin Olympics should be boycotted because of Hitler's 'negative' racial polices. Jesse Owens didn't think it worth a boycott. What more resoundingly positive statement could there have been for humanity via Owens winning four gold medals and Hitler having to greet him as a champion ... in view of the entire world? Chances are that Hitler viewed that as being negative.

A person threatened by the truth will interpret input that challenges them as being negative. I thought we teach our children that telling the truth is a positive thing. I wasn't aware that reality changed when we become adults.

Calling someone negative is a way to discredit and demean them. There's a difference between telling someone they are wrong and telling them they are being negative ... the latter invalidates the other person ... not usually a positive thing to do .

I'd rather be upset at being told the truth than patronized intro complacency by a falsehood. Things are rarely either positive or negative... They are what they are and what matters is whether they are true or not.

If a person writes to me that a meeting cannot and will not be an IEP meeting in multiple letters and tells others that it is an IEP meeting ... what is it I'm misunderstanding ?

If a person tells me that that they will move forward with their own offered plans, not what was requested and tells another person that what was requested has been set up even though their documention proves otherwise ... what is it I'm misunderstanding?

If a person asks for my input and then vilifies me for providing what was requested ... what is it I'm misunderstanding?

If my elected representatives say it isn't their job to represent me ... what is it I'm misunderstanding?

If a person who has a successful life is damaged by someone to the degree the harm severely affects their quality of life and the person who gets compensated regardless of the harm they inflicted is considered the victim ... what is it I'm misunderstanding?

If the media gave Parker Jensen's family a chance and listened to them but won't give someone going through the equivalent documented situation the same consideration ... what is it I'm misunderstanding?

If professionals say they have the best intentions of helping someone with autism and then repeatedly set up circumstances by which they can attempt to have that person arrested for autisitic manifestation ... what is it I'm misunderstanding?

Or maybe the current societal abomination deals with how non-autistic people sometimes treat those with the disorder whether they realize what they are doing or not; similar to how one group was torn from their homelands and confined to reservations ... another group given a free train ride to extermination ... another group torn from their homes and forced into relocation camps because of their ethnicity ... another group delegated to the back of the bus for the same reason ... another group institutionalized for not being able to conform to societal expectations ... and a plethora of examples from throughout humanity.

Maybe I'm not misunderstanding anything at all.

As for now, my priority is getting through the weekend. We are burying our Uncle Hank ... a decorated war hero from WWII and Korea ... a man who was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross. He did not serve selflessly and honorably so such injustices could be repeated and flourish.

Something interesting in the XVIII Amendment caught my eye yesterday.

Yes, I know this is the only Amendment to the U. S. Constitution to be repealed, but should that mean that all concepts within it be erased for eternity?

Section 2 of the XVIII Amendment states "The Congress and the several states have concurrent power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation".

This would seem to further define the X Amendment. The fact is that the X Amendment establishing states rights does have limitations. One is that states' rights cannot infringe on individual rights established under the same Amendment; explained to a better degree in the XIV Amendment. Another limitation is that states have to actually uphold their responsibilities granted under the X Amendment.

Concurrent power is an interesting and - dare I say it - powerful reality. It is a regular occurance between public agencies, private companies and neighborhoods who work together daily.

So, why do our modern day elected leaders hide behind states' rights and say they are unable to take action in difficult situations?  I'm sure this nation's Founding Fathers found themselves in complex situations frequently; it didn't stop them.

Maybe it's because today's leaders don't know what to do ... as if doing nothing will accomplish more.

Maybe it's because resolution won't be easy ... as if ease is the criteria by which civilized society solves problems.

Maybe it's because the first thing attempted doesn't automatically make the circumstances go away ... as if, metaphorically, giving up after throwing one bucket of water on a forest fire will result in the fire becoming enabled to extinguish itself at will.

When our elected leaders allow their constituents to be harmed because they are unwilling to choose concurrent enforcement over the easy route, they abdicate the job they were elected to do. When these elected officials write letters and leave phone messages feigning helplessness, their choice becomes especially abhorrent. I'd like to know their reasoning.

It becomes unacceptable for federal and state office holders to hide behind states' rights and federal limitations when the state refuses to take responsibility and enforce the laws they are charged with overseeing ... federal laws for which states receive federal funding.