Friendly teacher strike

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At the request of the Neshaminy school board, the Bucks County District Attorney’s Office will conduct a criminal investigation into allegations made by a teacher who recently spoke out against union leadership and had his car vandalized.

High school history teacher and football coach David Ferrara sent a letter last week to Neshaminy Federation of Teachers members describing intimidation and shunning from union leaders toward teachers who stray from certain policies.

The next day he found a tire slashed on his vehicle parked at the school.

After an internal investigation by district officials, school board President Ritchie Webb contacted District Attorney David Heckler to ask for help from his office to look into the vandalism and allegations of other incidents described in Ferrara’s letter.

“Our administrative team are not professionals in investigating things like this so they did their best to gather facts and verified the damage and the time periods in which it occurred,” Webb said Tuesday. “We have an instance of vandalism as well as other accusations described in (Ferrara’s) letter. We as a district need to know the truth and we also need to make sure none of our employees are being bullied or shunned.”

NFT President Louise Boyd released a statement Tuesday evening stating her opposition to such tactics.

“As we said after the allegations were raised last week by our colleague, David Ferrara, we condemn any and all acts of vandalism, harassment or intimidation against anyone — including our members who have supported our efforts and have been the victims of such malicious conduct,” Boyd said. “The NFT has not supported, encouraged or condoned such behavior. Since we do not know the scope or focus of the District Attorney’s planned investigation and have not been contacted regarding such an investigation, we cannot say anything at this time.”

The Middletown Police Department confirmed last week that a report was filed about the tire slashing incident, and Heckler said he will be in contact with the local authorities.

Heckler, however, made it clear that the investigation into the vandalism will focus on the actual perpetrator of the tire slashing.

“This kind of thing is generally pretty hard to prove who actually did it,” he added. “Even if you believe a group had motivation to see it through, as Ferrara did, we do not prosecute groups, just individuals.”

While Heckler said his office has not received any similar complaints from Neshaminy officials or teachers, he said he’d be happy to talk with anyone who feels they’ve been victimized — regardless of whether they are union supporters or detractors.

“Property crimes are property crimes,” he said. “They are usually straightforward but not always easy to prosecute.”

If there is a connection between the vandalism and the bitter contract dispute between the NFT and the school board, Heckler said he’d be disappointed.

“I think every law-abiding, right-thinking person would be deeply offended by the idea that a teacher, administrator or citizen could be subject to vandalism or other threats in order to force them to conform to a particular pattern of behavior,” he added.

Neshaminy teachers returned to work Jan. 20 from an eight-day strike. Lawyers from both sides are in discussions regarding how the mandatory process of non-binding arbitration will proceed.

“The contract issue is ongoing and separate from these other issues,” Webb said. “The attorneys are trying to select (a third, impartial) arbitrator.”

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