Rich Mitchell was fired from his job as superintendent of Bremen Community School District 228, outside Chicago, for being a big homo, or so (nearly) concludes the Cook County Human Rights Commission, which heard Mitchell’s complaint.
Relays Lambda Legal, which handled Mitchell’s case:
In 2004, Dr. Richard Mitchell interviewed for the position of superintendent of the Bremen Community High School District #228 with members of the School Board. As noted in the Commission report, during the interview process, School Board member Evelyn Gleason asked two other School Board members if they were aware that Dr. Mitchell was gay. The School Board members inferred that Ms. Gleason was opposed to hiring Dr. Mitchell because of his sexual orientation. The Board chose to hire Mitchell through the end of the 2007 school year. In his complaint, Dr. Mitchell alleges that, soon after he was hired, Gleason and another board member sought to invalidate Mitchell’s contract without informing the rest of the Board, but their attempts were rejected by the Illinois State Board of Education.
In early 2005, the School Board extended Dr. Mitchell’s contract through June 2009. Shortly thereafter, Gleason became president of the Board and replaced the School District’s legal counsel with the law firm where her son works. The new lawyer promptly circulated a memo to the Board asserting that Mitchell’s extended contract was invalid. When confronted by a parent wishing to understand why Mitchell’s contract was being contested, Gleason responded by saying, “Did you know that he’s gay?”
The case is actually an old one: Under review since 2006, the Commission only now found “substantial evidence” to indicate sexual orientation discrimination. It didn’t help that Mitchell himself was accused of editing videotapes of teacher interviews to make it look like the new hires were admitting to drug use and murder
L.
Thereby proving that victims can be a*holes as well.
Rich Mitchell
Or, you pathetic genious, victims might actually be VICTIMS. What if the video was well positioned? What if I actually presented it (before 600 faculty and staff) who loudly applauded and requested it to be posted on the school’s intRAnet because not everyone could hear it in the gym. What if three board members were present at the presentation and said nothing for a month……even while they were seen laughing and applauding the video? What if I had prefaced the video by saying that this is a comedic, Saturday-Night Live type event, meant to make our new faculty and staff feel welcomed to the district…giving them an opportunity to connect with existing faculty and staff….while I, myself, made FUN of myself in the process??? What if I charged the district on Sept. 24, 2006 with sexual orientation discrimination and on Sept. 28 they released this video (a MONTH after it was shown) to the news media, feigning their outrage??? Would that make you an a*hole? Oh….and what if you actually knew any of the facts, like the fact that the board president’s son was the new attorney for the district she had just voted in! Maybe now you’re a gaping a*hole? Perhaps????? Or maybe I’m wrong.