What should Linda Watson
have done to repair the harm
done by her crimes?
She had two choices:
either retract the allegations
she made (on February 10,
2001) when she called
Richard Werlin at his home,
or come forward and make
the allegations openly, so that
Maura Larkins could respond
to them.
Linda Watson Report 1
February 10, 2001
On Saturday night, at about 8:30 in the evening, Castle Park Elementary
teachers Linda Watson and Jo Ellen Hamilton called Assistant Superintendent
Richard Werlin at his home within a few minutes of each other. They made
reports which caused a fellow Castle Park Elementary teacher to be removed
from her classroom and placed on administrative leave.
The entire problem could have
been solved with no money
spent on legal fees by
anybody if Watson had simply
come forward and stated her
allegations openly and
honestly. Instead, she
worked with Robin Donlan
Educators president, to cover
up a series of crimes that
evolved from misdemeanors
to felonies and cost the school
district hundreds of thousands
of dollars to defend.
Cheryl Cox, Patrick Judd,
Pamela Smith, Bertha Lopez,
and Larry Cunningham, school
board members, and their
lawyers, Stutz, Artiano &
Shinoff, demanded that
teachers commit perjury to
cover up the Castle Park
Crime Wave.
week Maura Larkins came back to school, she brought two unopened
bags of tortilla chips for the monthly birthday celebration.
Strangely, Kathy Bingham didn't seem worried about poisoned food
then! She was gobbling up her lunch as if she had no worries at all.
Maura Larkins wanted her reputation cleared after she came back.
She wanted to give Kathy a chance to light-heartedly retract the
slander.
"You know, I brought some of the food today," she told Kathy.
It would have been appropriate for Kathy to say I don't really think
you're a potential murderer. I was just joking when I said you might
have poisoned the food.
But Kathy didn't say that. She stopped eating, and curled her lip,
clearly confirming Stephenie's report about Kathy's attitude. Kathy
said, with an expression of distaste, "What did you bring?"
"I'm not telling you that," Larkins said, not wanting Kathy to repeat
her earlier accusations, or to make a scene regarding the tortilla
chips. If Kathy really thought there was a poisoner on the staff,
Kathy should have stopped eating, and warned other staff members
to stop eating. Kathy kept eating, but never retracted her ugly
accusation.
After school, Maura Larkins was passing Kathy in the hall. Kathy
said nothing. Maura Larkins said, "You're looking good. You're
going to be all right." Larkins meant that Kathy's suggestions that
Maura would poison food were false, and that Kathy had obviously
suffered no harm from eating Maura's food.
But Kathy Bingham used these remarks to convince Linda Watson
that more action needed to be taken against Maura Larkins. It
wasn't hard. While Larkins had been on leave, Linda Watson had
told Maria Beers that Maura Larkins was the type of person who
became a mass murderer. "We're scared of her. Her way of doing
things is so different from ours."
Bingham was planting seeds of fear in very fertile soil. Watson was
already terrified that Maura Larkins would find out that Linda
Watson had committed crimes against Maura Larkins.
Administrative Law
Judge H. James Ahler
The next day, Friday, April 20, 2001, Linda Watson invented a false
story about Maura Larkins, and by that evening, Maura Larkins was
once again taken out of her classroom.
Watson's co-conspirators gathered up people to make accusations, but
the only other person besides Linda who would go on the record was
Al Smith, whose report, in writing, is bizarre in its inanity.
Richard Werlin made himself the third accuser on April 20, 2001. He
reasserted his own false statements about what happened on March
27, 2001 when he took Maura Larkins to a place where there were no
witnesses. His renewed allegations had no credibility at all: Werlin
had implicitly admitted that his story was false when he asked Maura
Larkins to return to work eight days after the imaginary incident. To
make his allegations even more unbelievable, he did not report them
to Maura Larkins' health provider when she called him over and over
again to find out what was going on.
Werlin deposition:
"She lives on a
boat."
Richard Denmon
speak to the principal. When Larkins finally knocked on the
principal's door, Principal Gretchen Donndelinger opened it a crack,
and told Larkins she would not speak to her that day. A year later
Larkins learned that there were four teachers hiding behind the door
that day!
Assistant Superintendent Richard Werlin,
Teachers Linda Watson, Richard Denmon, Kathy Bingham, Jo Ellen
Hamilton and Alan Smith were allowed to say anything they wanted
and have it accepted as true without question, while Larkins was not
allowed even to hear the accusations against her until a year later,
AFTER she had been dismissed.
What did they say?
Jo Ellen Hamilton says she merely asked Werlin when a meeting would take
place. But Richard Werlin testified that she told him she feared for her life.
What did Linda Watson say? Richard Werlin says she told him she feared
for her life--that Maura Larkins would kill her. Watson perjured herself
during deposition testimony, first saying she never called Richard Werlin,
then admitting that she did call him.
Teachers at Castle
Park Elementary
were forced to come
up with elaborate lies
to cover up the
reality of their refusal
to allow integration of
third grade
classrooms, and their
criminal actions
starting in 2000.
When Maura Larkins was on leave from February 12, 2001 until April
16, 2001, Castle Park Elementary School teacher Kathy Bingham
pointed out provide treats for the teachers' lounge that day.
"Better not eat anything," Bingham said. "Maura has lounge duty. It
might be poisoned."
This was reported to Maura by Stephenie Parker-Pettit, before
Stephenie began helping to cover up crimes against Maura Larkins.
Perjury Michael Carlson and atty Deborah K. Garvin
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Linda Watson Report 2
On April 20, 2001, Linda Watson made two false reports to school
administrators, causing Maura Larkins to be placed on leave a second time.
Why would Linda Watson make false allegations that she feared Maura
Larkins would kill her? Watson had more than one motivation. One of
them was that she wanted the school district to take action against Maura
Larkins based on Kathleen Elton's false allegations.
In Linda Watson's mind, Kathy Bingham's
warnings about the teachers' lounge treats
spelled death
The following is Linda Watson's deposition testimony
in Maura Larkins' dismissal hearing:
Linda Watson testified:
"I walked out to, you know, to my car, and I met--Kathy Bingham and
Jo Ellen Hamilton were standing outside in the walkway, and Kathy
Bingham was talking about something very unusual that had happened
to her, and she shared it with me, because she knew I had been very
upset, and, you know, all this was going on with Maura Larkins.
"And what happened was, Kathy Bingham said that Maura Larkins was
walking down the hallway, met Kathy Bingham in the hallway and said,
"Hi Kathy. You'll be all right," and walked on, and Kathy didn't really
know what that meant. She didn't understand why Maura would say
that to her, and I thought that was strange too.
"So I went home that evening, Thursday night. I was having dinner
with my son at Fillippi's in Pacific Beach, one of our favorite
restaurants. My husband was out of town, and just to relieve stress,
you know, I did talk to my husband and son about the situation. My son
knows Maura, and I told my son what Kathy Bingham had said, and my
son looks up at me, and he was 17, a junior in high school at that time,
and when I told him that Maura told Kathy that she'd be all right and
walked on, my son said, "Well, Mom, she just threatened you." And I
said, "What do you mean?" And he said, "She just said that Kathy was
going to be all right but the rest of you were going to be dead."
End of deposition quotations from page 22 line 2 to page 23 line 6.
Does Linda Watson have critical thinking abilities?
Is she able to guide young people toward rational thinking? When the
school district lawyer, Mark Bresee, who was sitting next to Ms. Watson
heard this testimony, why didn't he advise the district to get some
psychological help for Ms. Watson? Or advise that Watson be dismissed
for perjury? Because Mr. Bresee was deeply involved in covering up
the district's wrongdoing, and was interested only in covering up the
district's crimes, not in restoring sanity to the frenzied, irrational staff
district's legal game.
district's legal game.
Linda Watson's deposition testimony continued:
"And I had never even thought of it that way, but at that moment, like, a
wave of nausea just hit me. I sat there and almost got sick, and I said,
"Whoa." But because of all the school shootings and things, and all the
counseling they gave our kids at the high school, my son identified that
as a potential threat."
Maura Larkins finally insisted, after two years of having her 100%
Hispanic class being excluded from the grade level social studies and
science teaming, that her children be involved.
This made Linda Watson very angry. Page 23 Watson deposition
testimony: "When [Maura] wants something, she's just, by gosh, we're
going to do it, no matter what." Watson is clearly referring to Maura's
insistence that her 100% Hispanic class be integrated into the academic
program of the monolingual classes for a few minutes each day. This
was the only thing Maura ever insisted on, and it angered Linda Watson
greatly. Watson told Larkins that Watson opposed the bilingual
program. Watson had been virulently opposed to the program before it
started in September 1994, and had clearly not come to accept it when
she spoke these words in September 2002 (eight years later).
Maura Larkins was not the type of person who made frequent
complaints to the principal.
For example, Maura Larkins made one complaint, then dropped it,
during the fourth year of having her class assigned to sit in the back of
the auditorium during assemblies. Larkins pointed out to the principal
that her students, being limited in English, would benefit more than
English speakers from hearing better what was being said during
assemblies. Dr. Donndelinger answered that the seating chart could not
be changed.
Maura Larkins complained very little, even when she was the targeted
for harassment by Richard Denmon, Jo Ellen Hamilton, Allan Smith, and
Robin Donlan.
Teacher Richard Denmon told Maura Larkins to leave grade level
meetings when he was ready to discuss the English-only teaming
program.
Robin Donlan told Maura Larkins to sit at another table during an
inservice. Donlan stated a few days later, "Rick always gets me in
trouble." It was clear that Denmon had told Donlan what to say on this
occasion. Donlan and Larkins had never had any negative interaction
until Donlan's bizarre instruction to sit somewhere else than with her
grade level. But Denmon's head was close to Donlan's ear when Donlan
gave the order, and Denmon was staring at Maura Larkins like a guilty
kid with a stolen cookie in his pocket.
Interestingly enough, Robin Colls Donlan is using this same excuse in
2007 in an FBI investigation of how she came to receive $7.7 million
dollars worth of profits from illegal stock option sales. She claims her
husband got her in trouble. Regarding her conspiracy to illegally obtain
arrest records of an innocent person, Donlan blames Linda Watson,
Richard Werlin, and others who brought her crime to light when they
took action against Maura Larkins as a result of Donlan's crime.
Administrative Law Judge H.
James Ahler Was Suspended
for Unjudicial Behavior for
summoning Barbara Abeyta
and Terry Olson into a small
side room during a court
hearing when he heard about
Watson's fear of mass murder.
The Linda Watson story gets
even more bizarre when the
Office of Administrative
Hearings gets involved.
During Maura Larkins' dismissal
hearing, when Maura Larkins
testified about Linda Watson's
fear that she was "going
to be dead," Administrative
Judge Ahler jumped up and
stood a while, while everyone
else in the hearing room sat
silently at attention. Then Ahler
went into a small side room,
about three feet from the
witness chair where Maura
Larkins was sitting.
Ahler motioned the two other
panelists of the Commission on
Professional Competence
(Barbara Abeyta and Terry
Olson) to come into the room
with him. They trotted over
obediently. Out of the hearing
of
the court reporter, the judge told
the panelists (within the hearing
of Maura Larkins) that they
were to
disregard what Maura Larkins
had just said.
He told them the panelists that
because
Larkins didn't know about
Watson's attitude at the time she
made her allegations against
Larkins, the allegations didn't
have anything to do with
Larkins' state of mind. No--of
course not--but the allegations
certainly did have a lot to do
with LINDA WATSON'S STATE
OF MIND! The accuser was
clearly unreliable! Watson had
a strong motive to lie, to invent a
story that would cause Larkins
to be removed again. This
motive is in addition to her
motive of not wanting Larkins to
find out that Watson had
committed a crime against
Larkins. Perhaps Watson's
guilty knowlege that she had
harmed Larkins made her come
up with the absurd notion that
Larkins would use some forum
other than a legal one to seek
redress. The six years that have
passed since 2001 have proven
that Larkins is interested only in
telling the truth, and pursuing
justice in the courts.
As he gave instructions to the
two panelists out of hearing of
the court reporter, Ahler realized
that Larkins could hear him.
He shut the door, and
remained behind the door
for about 10 minutes.
When he came back out, he
made no mention of the bizarre
trip to the side room. The court
reporter began recording again
as if nothing had happened.
For these actions and other
misbehavior in this case,
Judge Ahler was placed on a
two-week suspension.
Is it possible for a
lie to become a
delusion?
Did Linda Watson at
some point begin to
believe her own lies?
Some people believe
that she was truly
afraid for her life.
I think that Ms. Watson
is very good at
launching into hysteria
at will, but I think that
it's hard to behave
hysterically without
feeling a bit of hysteria.
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