Central Bucks superintendent and principal publicly defend themselves at termination hearing amid Jamison child abuse allegations

Central Bucks Superintendent Steven Yanni and Jamison Elementary School principal David Heineman both took the stand at their joint termination hearing Wednesday to fight claims that they mishandled child abuse allegations, publicly sharing their side of the scandal.

Yanni wanted to make one thing clear: He acted, he said, based on information given to him by other district administrators and legal counsel about abuse allegations in an autistic support classroom.

“As a superintendent, I need to be able to trust the people around me to give me the information that I might not have or not know,” Yanni said.

Heineman, for his part, disputed previous claims that he advised teachers, who are mandatory reporters of child abuse, to consult him before reporting abuse. He also said he was not in a position to fire staff involved in incidents.

The Central Bucks school board approved statements of charges against Yanni and Heineman in June; the public hearing that played out this week was the next step in the termination process. The board is expected to vote on their employment in September.

In roughly three hours of public testimony before school board members at district headquarters Wednesday, Yanni spoke about action he took in response to reports that teacher Gabrielle McDaniel and educational assistant Rachel Aussprung abused students in an autistic support classroom at Jamison.

Yanni’s attorney, David Truelove, worked to debunk claims that Yanni had lied to or misled parents, the school board, or police. He also highlighted that other administrators did not take timely action.

Truelove said that Yanni’s reputation had been damaged and that he was being “scapegoated.”

On Tuesday, district solicitor Peter Amuso presented his case against Yanni and Heineman, calling several witnesses who said the two failed to take appropriate or timely action to address reports of abuse last fall. The school board has also moved to terminate three other employees after a report from Disability Rights Pennsylvania found that a teacher and an educational assistant abused students in an autistic support classroom by illegally restraining them, causing a “reasonable likelihood of bodily injury” and likely interfering with their breathing.

“I’ve gone through an entire range of emotions,” Yanni said of being placed on leave.

The superintendent said he responded to abuse reports based on information given to him by administrators he trusted, including those who had expertise in special education. Those individuals, Yanni said, did not indicate that there was abuse, thus delaying the eventual report to ChildLine, Pennsylvania’s reporting system for child abuse or neglect.

Yanni said that on Nov. 20, Robert Freiling, the district’s human resources director, who was also put on leave, presented additional information to Yanni from Alyssa Kline, a personal-care assistant and the whistleblower who made the initial child abuse reports at Jamison. That night, Yanni made a ChildLine report. A second, more detailed ChildLine report was made in January.

Truelove repeatedly emphasized Yanni’s character and said he had a strong reputation during his previous superintendencies at Upper Dublin and Lower Merion, noting that when he joined the district last year he was hired to “right the ship.” He said Yanni was taking over responsibility for a large district and arrived to a chaotic environment.

Heineman, the Jamison principal, said he had raised concerns about the support and supervision of special education to Alyssa Wright, the district’s director of pupil services.

Heineman’s attorney, Patricia Collins, also aimed to dispute claims that the principal wanted to fire Kline for reporting the abuse, saying he inquired about the whistleblower’s employment status only because Wright brought it up to him.

Heineman said that he told Jamison’s teachers and staff to loop in him, the assistant principal, or the school counselor when making a ChildLine report, but that they were never advised to ask permission before doing so — as some Jamison staff members testified Tuesday.

Amuso used cross-examination of Yanni and Heineman on Wednesday to suggest it was their responsibility to take timely and adequate action in response to the abuse allegations. He questioned why action was not taken after a Nov. 16 email from human resources manager Christine Trawinski — who has also been placed on leave — that included details from a fact-finding endeavor about the incidents at Jamison.

Yanni said he did not recall reading the email. Heineman said he did not make a ChildLine report after reading it because it presented information from Kline that was different from what she told him directly, and he added that other administrators, including Wright, knew this information before him.

Amuso argued that all the district leader cared about was keeping Central Bucks “out of the newspaper” — a reference to a line in Yanni’s testimony. (Yanni said that upon arriving at the district, he had wanted to keep unresolved matters that preceded him out of the news cycle.)

“He had all the information he needed to make a ChildLine report on Nov. 16,” Amuso said of Yanni. “What did he say? He gets ‘50 to 75 emails a day,’ he ‘didn’t have time to look at them all.’ How many emails does he get about child abuse?”