The Pasadena Unified School District’s defense of embattled Madison Elementary School principal Juan Ruelas took a major hit yesterday when a Superior Court Judge ordered it to produce 24 complete documents concerning Ruelas, which PUSD had been trying to keep portions of secret.
Yesterday was the trial of a Public Records Act lawsuit brought by Pasadena resident Pablo Alvarado, the Executive Director of the National Day Laborers Organizing Network (“NDLON”), and the Citizens Committee for Equality and Justice at Madison (“CCEJAM”), the organization of teachers, parents and community members who has been fighting for 1 ½ years to get Ruelas removed as Madison’s Principal. Their lawsuit sought complete copies of 30 documents they requested concerning which PUSD produced incomplete records. Los Angeles Superior Court Judge James C. Chalfant ordered PUSD to produce complete documents for 24 of the 30 documents that Alvarado and CCEJAM sought.
The biggest win for Alvarado and CCEJAM was getting the complete investigation report for Patricia Guzman, the teacher’s union representative at Madison. At the start of the 2015-2016 school year, Ruelas accused Guzman of abusing one of her students and induced the PUSD higher-ups to remove Ruelas from the classroom based on that allegation. Ruelas’ allegation was first made after Guzman had complained to the teachers union and Superintendent McDonald about unrelated issues with Ruelas. Hours later Ruelas claimed that he had observed Guzman abusing her student – even though he had not immediately reported the alleged abuse as required by law. When Guzman objected to her suspension the next day, Ruelas added an insubordination charge as a ground for the suspension. PUSD hired an outside investigator who supported the charge of insubordination but found that the evidence did not support Ruelas’ allegation that Guzman abused one of her students. After 6 months on suspension, PUSD returned Guzman to the classroom with no discipline other than a letter of reprimand for insubordination.
When Alvarado and CCEJAM made Public Records Act requests for the Guzman investigation report, PUSD produced the portions of the report favoring Ruelas – i.e., the portions sustaining the charge of insubordination – but with the names of witnesses redacted. But PUSD refused to produce the portion of the investigation report that favored Guzman – i.e., the portion of the report that exonerated her from the charge of child abuse. Yesterday Judge Chalfant ordered PUSD to stop favoring Ruelas and produce the whole report.
Another major victory for Alvarado and CCEJAM was Judge Chalfant ordering release of an unredacted June 4, 2011, letter by Ruelas that identifies the teacher whose cheating caused Roosevelt Elementary School (where Ruelas was principal at the time) to lose its Blue Ribbon School Award nomination.
In addition to those victories for Alvarado and CCEJAM, Judge Chalfant ordered PUSD to produce 22 complete documents related to Ruelas concerning which PUSD had produced only parts of them and/or redacted portions of them; Judge Chalfant allowed PUSD to redact the student names in them. Dale Gronemeier, one of the attorneys for Alvarado and CCEJAM, said of these documents: “We don’t know what PUSD is suppressing with these documents.
But the fact that PUSD has unjustifiably withheld them leads us to believe that they may provide more ammunition showing the unsuitability of Ruelas to be Madison’s principal.” Gronemeier and his co-counsel in the Public Records Act lawsuit, Skip Hickambottom, have submitted to PUSD’s Board of Education a 41 page White Paper on Roosevelt Elementary School Cheating During Juan Ruelas’ Principalship as part of Alvarado’s and CCEJAM’s demand that PUSD reopen an investigation of cheating over the 6-year period during which Ruelas was Roosevelt’s Principal.
