A coach whose team played for a title was fired for blowing the whistle on his school, lawsuit says
The former boys basketball coach at a South Carolina high school is suing the school district over claims that he was fired for blowing the whistle on the school for serious infractions.
In his lawsuit, Andre Weathers says he was fired for reporting Hemingway High School and the Williamsburg County School District for changing grades of students, covering up claims of of sexual harassment and the misuse of government funding, among other charges, scnow.com reported.
Things weren't always this contentious.
Weathers worked at Hemingway for a little more than a year, and led the boys basketball team to the Class A state championship game in the 2015-16 season.
But he was fired in September 2016 after blowing the whistle on the school and school district to the South Carolina Department of Education, wpde.com reported.
But that wasn't the reason Weathers was given for his termination, he says.
According to Weathers, another school district employee created a phony social media account where Weathers was accused of seeking out an improper relationship with students, scnow.com reported.
His teaching certificate was suspended after his firing, although Weathers was never charged and has no arrest history, according to wpde.com.
Weathers regained his teaching certificate in March 2017, and now is the boys basketball coach at Marion High School, where he guided the team to the Class AA state semifinals in his first season.
In spite of regaining his certificate and getting a new job, Weathers is seeking retribution for his time since being fired at Hemingway.
“I had to go a whole year, and when you apply at places, they do background checks and all that kind of stuff,” Weathers said to scnow.com. “And with it being online, everybody — we’re in a technology age — Googles and sees things. And I had a lot places that I interviewed . . . they said no because of what was out there.”
Weathers is suing the school district for wrongful termination in violation of the Teacher Dismissal Act, Whistleblower Act and Public Policy; Civil Conspiracy; due to process violations and defamation and intentional infliction of emotional distress or outrage and negligent Retention and supervision, according to the lawsuit.
In the lawsuit, against the school district and some former and current employees, Weathers wants back pay and other compensatory and punitive damages in an amount to be determined by a jury, as well as damages for allowable state claims, wpde.com reported.
Weathers claims in the lawsuit that a school janitor was accused of offering girls $50 for kisses; an intervention specialist was accused of sexually harassing a teacher, and a teacher was accused of sexually harassing a female student. All three were transferred but not fired, according to the lawsuit.
The lawsuit also mentions an accusation of an athletic director accused of sexually harassing a coach, which was reported to the middle school and high school principals and personnel, according to scnow.com, which said the athletic director kept his job and the victim faced retaliation and was transferred to another school.
While Weathers is moving forward following the firing, there have been difficulties for the Williamsburg County School District.
On April 11, SC Schools Superintendent Molly Spearman declared a "state of emergency" for Williamsburg County schools, saying the state Education Department will take over the district's daily operations indefinitely, including its financial decisions and hiring.
Carrie Brock, who was named in Weathers' lawsuit along with Frankie Tisdale and Donna Palmer-Lewis, was fired by the state, along with the district's school board.
“Two years ago, I tried to tell everybody this,” Weathers said to scnow.com. “It took the state department to come in and say the exact things that I said was going on, for the state department to come in and take over.”
Both scnow.com and wpde.com said attempts were made to contact the defendants named in Weather’s lawsuit, but there were no responses.
This story was originally published April 22, 2018 at 5:50 PM with the headline "A coach whose team played for a title was fired for blowing the whistle on his school, lawsuit says."