Handwriting on the Walls: Fairfield City Schools Caught in Yet Another Lie in the Emilie Olsen Case

The handwriting was on the walls for Fairfield City Schools in the Emilie Olsen case in the days and hours before and after her death on December 11, 2014.  Literally.

We'll prove that.  We'll also prove yet again that Fairfield City Schools LIED in it's official federal court filing response to the Emilie Olsen case.

When will Fairfield finally just start to tell the truth?  Or hire better liars.  It really is sad and pathetic that Fairfield is incapable of being honest.  And when one considers that the evidence we used to catch the district in yet another lie about Emilie's case is widely available in public records, it is puzzling Fairfield would even be dishonest anyway.  What is it with these people?

In the federal lawsuit filed against Fairfield City Schools, it's employees privately, and several students, it was alleged that graffiti existed in the middle school that was derogatory and possibly racist towards Emilie Olsen .  We have published an image of this allegation in the Olsen lawsuit below.

This allegation by the Olsen family regarding hateful graffiti on the walls of Fairfield Middle School was denied in the district's official response filed in federal court early this year.  You can read more about that here.  In fact, every allegation - literally every last one in the 100+ page filing by the Olsens - was denied by Fairfield City Schools.

In April 2016, our group submitted a records request to Fairfield City Schools to try to get to the bottom of these graffiti allegations involving Emilie.  Our reasoning was that if the graffiti did exist, then a paper trail of maintenance requests might have led to it's removal.  We were told by the district that no such records existed, and have posted that e-mail exchange below.

Like everything else involving Fairfield City Schools when it comes to Emilie Olsen, the district is lying again.  Plain and simple, they're LIARS.  We'll prove it.

Check out this e-mail from the day after Emilie Olsen died, between her science teacher and Fairfield Middle School Assistant Principal Mark Rice (For more on Mr. Rice's dirty hands in Emilie's case, please click here).  As you can clearly see, this December 12, 2014 e-mail, sent at 11:46 AM that morning, clearly indicates that graffiti about Emilie Olsen did decorate the bathroom walls at FMS.

So, we have proof that administration at Fairfield City Schools was notified that yes, indeed there was graffiti about Emilie Olsen in FMS around the time of her death.  Kind of makes Fairfield's denials about the graffiti in their response to the Olsen lawsuit look like a sickening and ridiculous pack of lies, doesn't it?  That's because it is.

What did Mark Rice do with this information in the e-mail above?  We don't know.

We have his e-mails and those of other administrators and the Superintendent, and can verify that this note from Emilie's science teacher was never forwarded to anyone by Mr. Rice.  Nor is any mention of graffiti mentioned in the Fairfield Township Police Report.

Why, Mark Rice?  What did you do with the information given to you in that e-mail?

Fairfield City Schools' lies go deeper than that however.  Not only do records exist in the form of e-mails proving that the the district was made aware of the racist, bullying graffiti about Emilie Olsen at Fairfield Middle School, but we have reason to believe the district has actual images of the writings themselves.

Check out these e-mails sent by an unknown party to Fairfield Middle School Principal Lincoln Butts on December 17, 2014.  The images depicted in the boys and girls restrooms at FMS are redacted because they contain student names.  Note the last of the images contains the date Emilie died, "12-11-14."  We'll give you three guesses to figure out the student name redacted in these pictures.

Notice in this e-mail also sent on December 17, 2014, that some kind of unknown graffiti also existed in Cafeteria C.  That's the cafeteria Emilie ate in.  That's the cafeteria where the October 21st, 2014 bullying incident we have spoken about before unfolded.  One guess as to whose name is under this redaction:

We're no attorneys or legal experts by any means.  But it seems like in the civil case filed against them by Emilie Olsen's estate, Fairfield City Schools has been caught in yet another whopper of a lie.

What did Mr.Butts do with the information in these e-mails?  Again, we can find no e-mail evidence these images were ever forwarded to his superiors or police.  Why?  What was done?

These documents that prove the existence of the graffiti about Emilie, and establishes that proof of the same was in Fairfield's possession from just hours after she died.   The first e-mail to an FMS administrator was sent the morning after Emilie died.

Judging from the official police report into the incident, it appears Fairfield employees never bothered to inform law enforcement about the graffiti regarding Emilie that the school knew existed.  If that isn't obstruction of justice, then it ought to be.  It should be illegal in some from or fashion what employees at Fairfield City Schools have done here.

And frankly, how dumb does one have to be to deny in federal court the existence of graffiti that is openly documented in public records available to anyone who bothers to request them and look for it?  If some irrelevant internet watchdog activist group was able to piece all this together, Fairfield, what is a real lawyer, or even state and federal investigators going to do?  We wouldn't want to be in the legal position of Fairfield City Schools right about now.

Fairfield lied and Emilie died.  The handwriting is on the walls as to Fairfield's guilt.

#JusticeforEmilie

Lots of Talking Going on at Fairfield Behind that Wall of Student Privacy Laws

To use the words of a certain official at Fairfield City Schools, when it comes to exposing your conduct during the Emilie Olsen case, it would be a mistake to say "We're done with you!"

We will be presenting for your review an e-mail exchange from May 2015 between two district employees regarding the Emilie Olsen case.  The level of dishonesty contained in the e-mail is shocking, and we will provide you with the proof as to why.  We have some serious concerns about the content of this e-mail, as well as the untrue statements being issued by the district's spokesperson.

The e-mail exchange in question, posted below, was likely prompted by the public outcry that accompanied the May 2015 WCPO -I-Team investigation into Emilie Olsen's case.  You can view that report here.

As many of you probably recall, when the I-Team reported about Emilie's case, there was shock across the entire Tri-State.  Despite their statements to contrary, Fairfield City Schools in fact was fully aware of the fact Emilie was being bullied.  WCPO had the documents to prove it.

After the I-Team report hit the airwaves, Fairfield City Schools was roundly criticized.  The district was inundated with negative publicity and scorn from all quarters.  There were even angry outbursts at a Board of Education meeting.  And yet all Fairfield did in the face of a firestorm of criticism was issue canned statements and cite student privacy laws.  In the minds of many people, this made the district appear all the more guilty; and compelled unquestioning Fairfield supporters to demand a response.

Now that you have an understanding of the context about surrounding events, please read for yourself the May 16, 2015 e-mail exchange between Fairfield City Schools Public Relations Director Gina Gentry-Fletcher and Instructional Specialist Lori Wegman:

While the e-mail may seem innocent enough at first glance, we're going to prove that there's enough baloney in Gina Gentry-Fletcher's response to open a deli.  We'll start at the beginning of Ms. Gentry-Fletcher's response, and dismantle it, point by point.

Ms. Gentry-Fletcher states "We had one report of bullying from her dad prior to the start of the school year from when she attended FIS..."

That's a LIE.  And Gina Gentry-Fletcher knows it.  Here's the proof:

This was an e-mail exchange between Marc Olsen and Fairfield Middle School Assistant Principal Mark Rice from September 8, 2014.  As you can see, it was forwarded by Mr. Rice to Gina Gentry-Fletcher on December 15 , 2014.  We have the original e-mail, which was also sent to FMS Guidance Counselor Erica Green, if anyone is interested in seeing it.

As you can see for yourself in the e-mail above, Mr.Olsen clearly identifies a particular student in a specific classroom at FMS in September 2014 that was harassing Emilie Olsen.  In other words, bullying.

So how can Ms. Gentry-Fletcher claim that the school was never notified of any bullying of Emilie at FMS during the 2014-2015 academic year, when she herself was copied on an e-mail indicating specific harassment that was taking place?  Why was Ms. Gentry-Fletcher discussing intimate particulars of Emilie's case with Ms. Wegman anyway?

More importantly, what was done by Assistant Principal Mark Rice to address this harassment Mr.Olsen identified specifically?  Was the bullying policy adhered to?  Was the building administrator or the Superintendent's office notified of the bullying, as district policy demands?  We can't find proof of it.

Moving on...

Further in her May 2015 e-mail to Lori Wegman, Ms. Gentry-Fletcher states "The incident ch9 referred to in October did not involve __ ([sic] Emilie).  The reporter insists that she is one of the students who completed an incident report but she is not."

That's just not true.

First off, as anyone who watched the I-Team story can see, at no time did reporters claim Emilie herself wrote any of the eyewitness statements regarding an October 21st, 2014 bullying incident in the cafeteria at Fairfield Middle School.  The I-Team simply published the documents and identified Emilie as the target of that bullying incident.

Additionally, in subsequent e-mails with reporters, district officials have claimed that the October 21st incident being referenced had nothing to do with Emilie.  That's just not the case.

We've published these documents before, but must do so again.  These are the eyewitness statemnets to the October 21st, 2014 cafeteria incident at Fairfield Middle School.  As you can see for yourself in the first image below, it says as plain as day, "File under Emilie Olsen."  Look:

And as you can also clearly see in the eyewitness statement above, Emilie Olsen was specifically named as being the target of bullies then and there, at the FMS cafeteria on October 21, 2014.  How can anyone who isn't a liar or not very bright claim the October 21st incident described in these eyewitness statements did not involve her?

Please read the rest of the eyewitness reports for that day as well.  The statements clearly describe a bullying event where Emilie's friends attempted to come to her rescue because of harassment actively taking place then and there at FMS on October 21st, 2014.  Not the previous academic year at the Intermediate building.

This e-mail exchange between district employees - even if we had not conclusively proven it to be a pack of complete lies - raises some very troubling questions about Fairfield City Schools.

Why is the Public Relations Director speaking about the Emilie Olsen case at all with a frontline staff member?  Why is Fairfield speaking about private details of Emilie's case with district employees, while cowering behind student privacy laws to the public?  Has FERPA - the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act - been violated?

We'll wait with bated breath for an explanation from Fairfield City Schools.  But there are other questions that need asking too:

Have student privacy laws been violated here?   Has professional misconduct taken place under Ohio Department of Education regulations?  Is this e-mail one more example in a long pattern of abuses and misconduct by Fairfield City Schools?  Does this e-mail only provide further proof of a pattern of conduct by Fairfield City Schools that resulted in Emilie Olsen being deprived of her civil rights under federal law?

We think so.  What do you think?

We'll be sending all of this information along to state education officials in Columbus, and you can rest assured it will get into the hands of federal investigators at the Justice and Education Departments.  Fairfield City Schools can just explain all this to the proper officials.  Because they lack the integrity to come clean with this community.  You can bet on that.

#JusticeforEmilie