At Benjamin Cosor Elementary School six teachers have hired attorneys and refused to cooperate in a police investigation surrounding the second discovery in three months of heroin and drug paraphernalia in a faculty bathroom, according to Yahoo News.
On February 11, an unidentified staffer discovered a heroin baggie in a men's faculty bathroom and before that, on December 23, someone found heroin and a bunch of heroin needles in the very same bathroom, Yahoo News reported.
Investigators subsequently used camera footage to identify half a dozen teachers as well as a teacher's aide as suspects possibly responsible for the baggie, according to Yahoo news. All seven staffers also agreed to provide urine samples.
Shortly after the school district's teachers union got involved and advised the six elementary school teachers and the teacher's aide to hire attorneys, according to Yahoo News. All the suspects also immediately stopped cooperating with police investigators.
Simmie Williams, the police chief in Fallsburg, is not amused by the union's tactics, according to Yahoo News.
"If you got nothing to hide, give me some urine," Williams said, according to Yahoo News. "Let's clear the teachers' names who are taking care of these babies for six or seven hours a day."
Teachers have complained that investigators have visited Cosor Elementary during school hours, with kids around, Yahoo News reported. Teachers are particularly bothered that students have seen police attempt to interview faculty members.
Jim Farrell, the Sullivan County district attorney, is also part of the investigation and noted that he's never had to deal with heroin in the area's bucolic public schools until now, Yahoo News reported.
"We intend to get to the bottom of this because, at this point, we feel there's a potential danger to the students in that school," Farrell told The Record, the newspaper of Middletown, New York.
In a statement obtained by News 12 Westchester, a union representative said: "We support the removal of any person from the classroom posing a threat to the children in our charge. Our locals, however, also stand united in ensuring our members are treated fairly and that their due-process rights are protected," Yahoo News reported.
A recent Fallsburg school district meeting was moved to the local high school auditorium in anticipation of a crowd of angry local parents, Yahoo News reported.
Video footage identified an eighth suspect: a contract employee who was at the elementary school to provide occupational therapy, according to Yahoo News. That contract employee has already provided a urine sample, but the results of that sample are still unknown.
