Stonington The school system has released documents that identify the Stonington High School coach fired in December 2019, for sending inappropriate Snapchat and Instagram messages to female students, as former freshman boys basketball coach Bobby Atkins.
Atkins is a 2016 Stonington High graduate who previously played on the boys basketball team and who was hired to coach the 2019-20 season for a stipend of $3,509.
In the recently released review conducted by the state Office of the Child Advocate into whether the school system followed its policy in handling sexual harassment complaints lodged against former teacher and coach Timothy Chokas, state Child Advocate Sarah Eagan revealed that the school system had fired an unidentified coach for inappropriately contacting two girls, one of whom was 15.
Stonington The state Office of the Child Advocate has found that school officials knew of the sexual harassment allegations against high school teacher and coach Timothy Chokas from 2013 to 2017 and did not take all the steps it could to respond to the allegations before allowing him to resign after more complaints in 2019.
In a 52-page report, the office also criticizes school officials for not documenting or following up on the allegations against Chokas or placing complaints in his file, and pointed out that at least one teacher failed to report concerns about suspected abuse to the state Department of Children and Families or police as required by law.
Stonington The school system fired an unidentified high school coach in December 2019 for sending inappropriate Snapchat messages to two female students.
The firing was revealed Tuesday, when the state Office of the Child Advocate published a 52-page report that criticized school officials for their handling of the sexual harassment allegations against former high school teacher and coach Timothy Chokas.
The OCA report states that during its investigation, another set of allegations emerged about a male coach s inappropriate communications with two minor girls, one of whom was 15.
The termination of the coach was never mentioned by school administrators in the monthly personnel reports that were distributed to school board members at the time. Those reports list resignations, retirements, leaves, appointments and other personnel changes.