Don Reiter, former Waterville Senior High School principal, will not appeal the Waterville Board of Education’s Nov. 16 decision to fire him for asking a student for sex.
“Don is not appealing,” Reiter’s attorney, Gregg Frame, said Wednesday in an email. He didn’t elaborate.
Aug. 26, 2015: Students in kindergarten through grade six, as well as ninth grade, start the school year in Alternative Organizational Structure 92, which includes Waterville, Winslow and Vassalboro schools.
Aug. 27: The school year begins for all other students in AOS 92. Superintendent Eric Haley learns of allegations against Waterville Senior High School Principal Don Reiter.
Aug. 31: Haley calls Reiter to notify him he is on paid administrative leave. Haley begins in-house investigation.
Sept. 1: Haley puts Reiter on paid administrative leave.
Sept. 2: Haley notifies the Waterville Police Department of allegations against Reiter.
Sept. 4: Haley tells Waterville Senior High School faculty and staff members that Reiter is on administrative leave and that Assistant Principal Brian Laramee will be acting principal. Haley sends an official leave notification letter to Reiter via overnight U.S. Postal Service to Reiter’s Mount Vernon home.
Sept. 5: Haley says he and Assistant Superintendent Peter Thiboutot are conducting an internal investigation. Waterville police Chief Joseph Massey says police are conducting a separate investigation. Reiter’s attorney, Gregg Frame, says he and Reiter are anxious to speak with Haley to understand why Reiter has been placed on leave.
Sept 8: Frame indicates the allegations against Reiter have to do with another person. Reiter and Frame meet with Haley and Thiboutot and the school’s attorney, Melissa Hewey, at Hewey’s Portland office. Frame says he fully expects Reiter will be returned to school soon.
Sept. 10: Haley says high school teachers, secretaries and other staff support members are among those interviewed in the school investigation.
Sept. 15: Reiter’s wife, Terri, files for divorce.
Sept. 25: Waterville police send their recommendation in the case to District Attorney Maeghan Maloney.
Oct 7: Haley recommends to the Board of Education that Reiter be dismissed from his job.
Oct. 19: A public dismissal hearing for Reiter is scheduled for Nov. 10; Frame says Reiter wants the hearing to be public.
Nov. 2: Maloney says she will wait to announce a decision in the Reiter police investigation until after the Nov. 10 hearing before the school board.
Nov. 3: Reiter tells the Morning Sentinel in an interview with his attorney, Gregg Frame, “I absolutely deny the allegation.” The nature of the allegation has not been made public.
Nov. 10: In opening statements of Reiter’s dismissal hearing with the school board, school department attorney Melissa Hewey says that Reiter called a female student into his office, closed the door and asker her to have sex with him on Aug. 27.
Nov. 12: The school board meets again to hear evidence in Reiter’s case; much of the hearing is in executive session. Many of those who attend the hearing appear to support Reiter and he is given a standing ovation at one point.
Nov. 15: The Waterville Police Department confirms to the Morning Sentinel it is looking into similar allegations against Reiter in New Hampshire, where he worked at Mascenic Regional High School in New Ipswich from 1998 to 2004, after the Sentinel received anonymous emails about the allegations.
Nov. 16: A Waterville Police Department news release, issued hours before the school board plans to vote on Reiter’s fate, outlines allegations by two former students of Reiter in New Hampshire that say he had inappropriate relations with them. Police say they have 147 pages of letters purportedly from Reiter to one of the students referencing their “taboo relationship.”
Nov. 16: The school board votes 6-1 to dimiss Reiter.
Nov. 19: Kennebec County District Attorney Maeghan Maloney says Reiter will be charged with official oppression, a class E misdemeanor that “holds public officials accountable for misuse of their office.”
Dec. 16: Frame says Reiter will not appeal his dismissal as the 30-day window for filing the appeal closes.
From published reports, hearing testimony and interviews.
Reiter, 44, of Mount Vernon, was not immediately available for comment. He did not answer a call to his cellphone Tuesday afternoon.
Eric Haley, superintendent of Alternative Organizational Structure 92, which includes Waterville, Winslow and Vassalboro schools, had recommended the board dismiss Reiter. Haley and Assistant Superintendent Peter Thiboutot had conducted an in-house investigation into the allegation that Reiter asked the female student for sex Aug. 27, the first day of school, after calling her into his office from class. The student is 18.
“I’m just glad to have the whole thing behind us,” Haley said Wednesday of Reiter’s decision not to appeal.
Melissa Hewey, the school district’s attorney in the case, said Wednesday that she also is glad.
“I’m happy that this is over,” said Hewey, of Drummond Woodsum, of Portland. “I think that the school and school department have done a lot to move on and put this behind them, and I’m glad it’s not going to come up again.”
Frame, of Taylor, McCormack & Frame, also of Portland, did not say immediately why Reiter decided not to appeal. Reiter had 30 days from the time the school board fired him to appeal, and Wednesday marked day 30.
Waterville police conducted a separate investigation of the allegation against Reiter and forwarded its report to Kennebec County District Attorney Maeghan Maloney. Maloney’s office, in conjunction with police, charged Reiter with official oppression Nov. 19. Reiter’s first court appearance is scheduled for Feb. 9 in Waterville District Court.
Official oppression, a misdemeanor, is a charge that seeks to make educators and those in positions of authority accountable for their actions.
Susan Reisert, the only School Board member to vote against firing Reiter, said Wednesday that she is disappointed he decided not to appeal the board’s decision.
“I’m disappointed, but I would say I understand,” Reisert said.
Reisert said she voted as she did because she was not convinced that what Reiter was accused of happened. She still is not convinced, she said.
“I would vote the same way today,” she said.
She said she thinks there were problems with the investigation and there’s a lot she cannot say publicly — and should not say.
“This is just a very difficult situation,” she said. “I don’t think anyone on the board expected this is something we’d have to deal with.”
School Board Chairwoman Sara Sylvester said she is pleased and relieved Reiter will not appeal.
“I think it’s time for the student body at the high school and everyone to just heal and move on, and an appeal would have just dragged it on and on,” Sylvester said.
Reiter’s wife, Terri, filed for divorce two weeks after Haley placed him on administrative leave Sept. 1.
Reiter said in an interview with the Morning Sentinel Nov. 7 that their marriage could not withstand the stress the fallout from the allegation caused. The couple have a young daughter. Reiter also said he was cleaning and organizing his house to prepare for selling it in the event he was dismissed from his job.
Meanwhile, two former students at Mascenic Regional High School in New Ipswich, New Hampshire, where Reiter worked from 1998 to 2004, also allege they were victimized by him. One former student told Waterville police in November that she had a sexual relationship with Reiter just before or after she graduated and another student said she had an inappropriate relationship with him when she was 17 and he sent 147 pages of letters to her in which he professed his love for her and referred to their “taboo” relationship.
Waterville police said they planned to share their report of the New Hampshire allegations with New Ipswich police, but New Ipswich police Chief Timothy Carpenter said Wednesday in a phone interview that he has not received that report yet or heard anything from Waterville police.
“We’re just sitting and waiting,” Carpenter said. “I would have thought we’d have it by now, but we haven’t received anything.”
Waterville police Chief Joseph Massey said Wednesday that detectives have been busy on that and other cases and plan to send the report to the New Ipswich Police Department as soon as everything is wrapped up. Waterville detectives have been sifting through the 147 pages of letters and checking to see if there’s anything they need to get an answer to, and that takes time, Massey said.
“We’re hoping before too long they will be able to wrap it up and get the reports done and send them to New Hampshire,” Massey said.
Amy Calder — 861-9247
Twitter: @AmyCalder17
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