NEW YORK (NY)
The New York Times
May 7, 2019
By Corina Knoll
An arbitrator ruled last month that Joseph DeShan can remain in the classroom, igniting a debate between parents determined to oust him and those who defend the longtime teacher.
It began last fall, when students new to Cinnaminson Middle School in New Jersey brought home rumors of a “rapist” at the school.
Eventually, their alarmed parents discovered that a teacher, Joseph DeShan, had a past life as a Roman Catholic priest in Bridgeport, Conn.: In the late ’80s, when then-Father DeShan was about 30 years old, he began a sexual relationship with a girl half his age, with whom he had a child.
This information was not a secret. The teacher’s past had first surfaced in 2002, when he was briefly removed from the classroom but was allowed to return by the superintendent at the time. The small community of 16,000 seemed to accept his past.
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