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Arbitrator: Ex-priest who fathered child with teen decades ago can keep his teaching job in Cinnaminson

Joseph M. DeShan, 59, was previously suspended in 2002 but kept his job.

Joseph M. DeShan teaches at Cinnaminson Middle School.
Joseph M. DeShan teaches at Cinnaminson Middle School.Read moreCinnaminson Township Public Schools

A teacher at a Burlington County middle school can keep his job despite having fathered a child with a teen when he was a Catholic priest decades ago in Connecticut, according to a labor arbitrator appointed by New Jersey.

Joseph M. DeShan, 59, faced the same controversy early in his career with the Cinnaminson Township School District, when it was revealed in 2002 that he made a 16-year-old girl pregnant while he served as a priest in the Diocese of Bridgeport in Connecticut.

DeShan was suspended for three weeks, but reinstated after the district concluded that he had violated no rules or laws as a teacher.

His past resurfaced last year when parents complained to the board of education.

A parent told the board, “This man should not be here. Please protect our children,” the Cinnaminson Sun reported in November.

In December, the district filed charges against DeShan with the New Jersey commissioner of education seeking his removal as a sixth-grade reading teacher at Cinnaminson Middle School for “conduct unbecoming a staff member.”

The district cited DeShan’s record as a priest and a recent incident in which he allegedly told a female student, “Look at me. Let me see your pretty green eyes. You don’t see them too much anymore.”

The student said the comment made her uncomfortable and that he said it in a “weird voice,” according to the district.

In his April 2 decision, Walt De Treux, the arbitrator, ruled that the alleged comment was unsupported “hearsay.” He also ruled that the district, barring any new evidence of inappropriate conduct, must live with its 2002 decision.

“The fact that some parents now demand his removal from the classroom does not give the [board of education] a second opportunity to revisit pre-employment conduct of which it has been long aware,” De Treux wrote.

De Treux ordered the district to reinstate DeShan to his position with full back pay and benefits.

DeShan could not be reached for comment Friday.

Stephen Cappello, Cinnaminson’s superintendent of schools, said Friday night in an emailed statement: “Our district policy limits my capacity to comment about ongoing personnel and legal matters. We are certainly disappointed by the ruling, and we are currently working with counsel to determine our next steps. We will continue to make decisions that are in the best interest of our students and educational community.”

The revelation that DeShan had gotten a teen pregnant while he served as a priest was first reported by the Hartford Courant in 2002, and gained national attention because it involved Edward M. Egan, who had been the bishop of Bridgeport and later became the archbishop of New York. Egan died in March 2015.

The newspaper reported that Egan failed to notify police when he learned about DeShan’s sexual relationship with the girl.

“Egan allowed him to leave the priesthood and begin a new life as an elementary school teacher in New Jersey — with no record of sexual misconduct,” according to the article.

The teen became pregnant in September 1989, two months after her 16th birthday, the newspaper reported. That same month, DeShan revealed his relationship to church officials and requested a leave of absence.

“It was a consensual relationship that didn’t work out,” DeShan told the newspaper in a brief interview outside the school where he was then teaching fifth grade. He had since married a doctor, and they had two children.

The teen went on to raise their daughter as a struggling single mother, the Courant reported.

DeShan started his new career as a teacher in 1997.

The 2002 article led to DeShan’s suspension, but he enjoyed popularity in Cinnaminson and that made his return easier, the New York Times reported.

“He did come back today," then-superintendent Salvatore J. Illuzi told the Times, “and he was very positively received by his students and colleagues.”