Hernando County Sheriff’s Office (HCSO) has found that allegations of inappropriate behavior by a substitute teacher at the Winding Waters K-8 school in Weeki Wachee are unfounded. As a result, the school’s resource officer issued one student a juvenile civil citation for making a false report.
The HCSO launched its investigation earlier this month after administrators at the school were told that a substitute teacher was accused of the “inappropriate touching” of a female student during class. The substitute teacher was provided by and was an employee of the staffing company Kelly Services.
School administrators immediately removed the teacher from the campus. Parents were notified of the allegations and the substitute’s removal via an email message.
In the HCSO probe, detectives conducted numerous interviews and viewed video surveillance to determine the accusations levied against the substitute teacher were false.
According to HCSO Deputy Public Information Officer (PIO) Michael Terry, there was no evidence showing the substitute teacher was ever near the student who reported the incidents. Additionally, no other students corroborated the student’s accounts of the alleged incidents.
“The substitute teacher has been cleared of any wrongdoing or inappropriate touching in the reported incident,” Terry said. In addition to the HCSO probe the Hernando County School District and the Kelly Services staffing agency undertook investigations of their own.
Results of those investigations remain pending.
