Icky teacher sues
Fired amid claims he kissed 3 girls in B’klyn school Hate scrawl mars nabe in Queens
A Brooklyn teaching assistant who was fired over allegations he kissed three girls is suing the Department of Education, claiming the city’s investigation into his case was flawed.
Grigoriy Zagerson, 55, claims he was wrongfully fired from his job at P.S. 195 in Manhattan Beach on Sept. 17 following an investigation over claims he kissed two 6-year-old girls and an 8-year-old girl on the cheek, according to a lawsuit filed Friday in Manhattan Supreme Court.
Zagerson, who was employed at the school on Irwin St. and Shore Blvd. since 2010, was suspended without pay in March 2018, a year and a half before his dismissal, according to the suit.
The Brooklyn man is suing DOE, the agency’s head Richard Carranza, and the Special Commissioner of Investigation for wrongful termination.
The disturbing claims arose after a mother of one of the children told the school’s principal, Bernadette Toomey, that Zagerson had pulled her 6-year-old daughter “toward him by the arm and kissed her on the cheek,” a report filed by the investigator stateed.
The girl then told the principal that another student had seen the kiss. That child then disclosed that a “creepy” Zagerson had kissed her, too, the report noteed.
School officials learned the paraprofessional had also “paid close attention” to an 8-year-old girl in the class from Zagerson’s native Russia — who he admitted he “may have pecked” once on the cheek, according to the SCI report.
Zagerson also disclosed he “may have accidentally touched” another girl’s cheek when she “arrived at school upset,” but denied any impropriety, court papers say.
Zagerson rebutted the SCI report that substantiated the claims against him and called for his firing, according to court filings.
The former educator said that Toomey “interrogated young children” and failed to follow DOE protocol when she oversaw a “flawed” and “faulty” internal investigation into the accusations, the suit states.
Zagerson said this was evidenced in investigators’ failure to interview a number of staffers and pupils who were present when the alleged misconduct occurred. He also claimed the school declined to provide him with the girls’ statements despite promising to do so, according to the suit.
A spokeswoman for the DOE said Zagerson was fired after the SCI released its findings.
“These were troubling allegations that were reported for investigation to SCI, and he was terminated after the Special Commissioner substantiated the claims. We will review the suit,” Kimberly Joyce said.
Vile racist graffiti was scribbled along the sidewalk outside a Queens home Friday, police said.
“F—K WHITE PEOPLE” was spray painted in black capital letters in front of a home on 151st Ave. near 81st St. in the Lindenwood neighborhood on Thanksgiving morning, cops said.
As if the sentiment wasn’t disturbing enough, the words were underlined with red paint. The messages were discovered at around 4 a.m. and reported to police at around 10 a.m., according to authorities.
Similar messages were spray painted on nearby trees that said, “F—K WHITE,” police said. Days earlier, vandals covered a Queens bus shelter with anti-Muslim graffiti.
“If you see someone with a turban, chop it off,” someone wrote on a bus shelter at Ditmars Blvd. and Steinway St. in Astoria.