LAWSUITS    LAWSUITS    LAWSUITS

A former Belen Schools employee has filed a civil complaint in district court against the school district and an administrator for alleged harassment.

Charlene Esposito, who was employed by the district for eight and a half years, charges in her lawsuit that Ted Padilla, director of support services, called her a "fat cow" and a "slacker" in front of other employees.The alleged statements by Padilla reportedly regarded the complaint in the suit that said Esposito took an excused two-month medial leave for a cardiac condition.

"Mr. Padilla is looking forward to proving his side of the case in court," Padilla's attorney, John Stiff, said. "We have talked in depth and we believe the allegations are unfounded."

In the lawsuit, Esposito said she filed a harassment complaint which was handled in-house by the district. Padilla reportedly was required to apologize to Esposito, the lawsuit said.

Esposito charged that Padilla retaliated against her by transferring her to different departments around the district. "He made her workplace a hostile work environment by talking about her to other employees in a completely disparaging manner," the complaint said. "He has blamed her for newspaper stories regarding an employee's past DWIs and another's reduction in salary."

Esposito said she was compelled to resign to preserve her physical and mental health. She filed a complaint with an Equal Employmente Opportunity Commission in November 2000. In April, the EEOC sent her a letter informing her that they were dismissing her grievance.

"Charlene contacted 10 attorneys referred by the EEOC and all would not take the case, pleading they had full caseloads," said Esposito's attorney, Barbara Sanchez. "They didn't say one way or another if it was a good or bad case. If it had been a bad case they would have said so."I think this is a decent case.

"It is up court to determine if what happened rises to the level of sexual harassment or a hostile work environment." The Belen attorney added that from the information she has received and after interviewing potential witnesses, she believes her client was the victim of both a hostile working environment and retaliation by Padilla.

Esposito is asking the court to order her reinstated, damages for back pay, damage for the creation of a hostile work environment and attorney's fees and costs.

A Los Lunas High School principal no longer faces a charge of verbally assaulting a former teacher after a district judge ended the case this week.

Principal Rex Henington was charged by the former teacher, Darlene Goodman, for an incident that took place March 7 in the school's parking lot, according to court documents filed by Goodman. Goodman said Henington confronted her about leaving school early, became enraged and lunged toward her in a threatening manner as she sat in her car, according to court records.

Goodman no longer works for the school district. She was fired in October after a hearing before the school board that focused on an August faculty meeting. School administrators testified that Goodman was insubordinate and behaved irrationally at the meeting.

On Tuesday, District Judge Camille Martinez Olguin ended the assault case based on the technicalities of how an earlier dismissal of the charge was appealed. Henington was to go to trial in May, but he and his attorney, Michael Sanchez, asked that it be postponed. It was rescheduled for July 30 at 9:30 a.m., but Goodman did not show up at the proper time. Los Lunas Magistrate Judge Tody Perea then dismissed the charge with prejudice, which means it can't be refiled.

The decision to dismiss with prejudice can be appealed, but the appeal must be made within 30 days of the dismissal and in the same court that dismissed the case. Goodman, acting as her own attorney, instead appealed the dismissal to District Court, which led to Tuesday's hearing in front of Olguin. Because of the venue, Goodman was represented by a prosecutor from the 13th Judicial District Court, Carlos Elizondo.

Elizondo asked Olguin to send the case back to the lower court, but Olguin said she didn't have the authority. "What law allows me to tell a magistrate court (to look at it again)?" she asked. Olguin then denied Goodman's request for an appeal of the earlier dismissal, which in effect ends the case.

"He's very relieved," Sanchez said of Henington, who was at the hearing but who referred questions to his attorney. Goodman, who said she received bad advice that led to the problems with the appeal, said the system, which allows private citizens to bring criminal charges, doesn't provide enough legal aid.

"It's hard for an ordinary person with no job or money to get legal representation." Goodman said that, although the assault charge was dismissed, she was looking forward to a federal civil case that is progressing against Henington and the school district.

The lawsuit, which was filed in November by three former teachers, including Goodman and a current teacher, alleges they were sexually discriminated against and that Henington created an abusive and hostile environment. Goodman's allegations about the parking lot incident with Henington are included in the lawsuit.

Sanchez said he expects that the federal lawsuit will also end in his client's favor. "I think, during the civil case, facts and evidence will show that it never happened," he said.