STARKVILLE — Scott Colom said he first learned about recent allegations of a Starkville High School teacher touching students from news reports.
Per the language of the state’s mandatory reporter statute, Colom, district attorney for the 16th circuit, should have heard it directly from Starkville-Oktibbeha Consolidated School District. But Superintendent Tony McGee didn’t reach out to Colom’s office until Thursday, 15 days after Starkville police began investigating the allegations and a week after the teacher was arrested.
“With investigations in regards to allegations against teachers or school officials in the school context, the sooner the district attorney’s office can be made aware of those allegations, the better,” Colom told The Dispatch on Friday.
State law requires school officials to contact the DA, the Mississippi Department of Education and Child Protective Services in a timely manner when they learn of credible allegations of a school employee inappropriately touching a student.
But SOCSD also waited at least a few days before notifying MDE and failed to directly read Starkville Police Department into the situation, according to police officials.
Moreover, current district protocols don’t seem to comply with the letter of the law.
Kelvin Stanfield, 51, was charged May 23 with four counts of touching children for “gratifying his lust, or indulging his depraved licentious sexual desires.” Police previously reported the touching happened at SHS between March and May, and four victims came forward.
Stanfield, who teaches construction classes at Millsaps Career and Technical Center and coaches the SHS bowling team, has been removed from those duties and banned from entering any SOCSD campus until the investigation concludes, both McGee and Starkville Police Chief Mark Ballard confirmed.
McGee would not comment on whether Stanfield had been terminated or placed on administrative leave.
By statute, Mississippi Code 97-5-24 of 2020, when any public or private school employee is accused of fondling or having any sexual involvement with a student, “the principal of such school and the superintendent of such school district shall timely notify the district attorney with jurisdiction where the school is located of such accusation, the Mississippi Department of Education and the Department of Human Services, provided that such accusation is reported to the principal and to the school superintendent and that there is a reasonable basis to believe that such accusation is true.”
Any superintendent “or his designee” who fails to make those reports could be charged with a misdemeanor, according to the statute.
“It is a critical component in this type of investigation to review this statute while investigating allegations,” Ballard told The Dispatch in a written statement Wednesday.
However, in an interview with The Dispatch on Thursday, McGee, while acknowledging he is aware of the law, equivocated on his familiarity with it.
“It’s been in place for some time. It’s not something that’s visited often,” McGee said.
According to a 2022 study by the Association for the Treatment and Prevention of Sexual Abuse, 11.7% of recent graduates surveyed nationwide reported having experienced at least one form of educator sexual misconduct during grades K-12. Most reported sexual comments, with less than 1% reporting physical abuse or receiving sexual photos or messages.
School policy, actions
McGee said allegations like those made against Stanfield are most often reported first to a counselor, teacher or principal.
“Most of the time, it’s going to end up with a principal at the school, and … usually the principal is going to call over to the superintendent’s office,” he said.
From there, McGee said he notifies the chief of the district’s school resource officer force, as well as former SRO Chief Sammy Shumaker – who now acts as liaison between the district and SPD – and asks them to contact local law enforcement.
“We like to turn it over to local authorities (for an independent investigation) because our police force is also part of our school district,” he said.
SOCSD’s process also includes notifying MDE, McGee said.
In the Stanfield case, McGee said a school counselor filed a report with Child Protective Services (now a separate agency from DHS) and the school notified the superintendent at some point between May 13 and 14. McGee then contacted his SRO chief and Shumaker. SPD publicized May 15 it had begun investigating an SOCSD employee, leading to the first media reports on the matter.
But SOCSD didn’t notify MDE until May 17, according to an email from MDE Public Information Officer Shanderia Minor.
“When we first found out about it, we went into some internal investigation, too,” McGee told The Dispatch to explain the delay.
McGee also said he wasn’t sure how long it took SHS officials to notify him after learning of the allegations.
Statements from Ballard, which SPD PIO Brandon Lovelady texted to The Dispatch, said a SHS staff member verbally notified police May 13 that a “report would be coming in.” Within 48 hours, Oktibbeha County Youth Court provided SPD with the official report from Child Protective Services.
“Since this time, (SOCSD) and (CPS) have cooperated with our investigation,” the text reads.
Colom said he wasn’t officially notified until Oktibbeha County Prosecutor Haley Brown contacted his office after Stanfield’s arrest.
“The statute, to me, is intended to require notification to several different agencies because they want to ensure … you have the independent investigation and prosecution, and that nothing is handled internally improperly,” Colom said. “I would also point out that the statute exists because there are certain due process protections there for certain public officials, including teachers.”
For instance, teachers can’t be arrested for allegations in the performance of their duties without a probable cause hearing, something Stanfield was afforded before his May 23 arrest.
Extra due process, Colom said, comes with “notification requirements to agencies that have to be involved with that.”
Better communication, more training
Ballard believes better communication between the school district and SPD, though not codified in the statute, would make for smoother investigations.
“It is important to each of us to maximize our effectiveness, so we try to work together and look for ways to optimize our efforts as partners,” his statement read. “This includes establishing a dedicated communication line between police and school leadership to ensure seamless information sharing during future events.”
McGee didn’t disagree, calling SPD a “tremendous partner with our school district.”
“If we can improve anything, I’m sure we’ll get together and work on that,” he added. “… I think we can always go back and provide opportunities for training for our people, whether that’s administrators, myself, teachers. We want to provide teachers opportunities when they see something (to) say something, to have that … open door. … It’s a serious issue. We want safety for all of our kids and for our teachers.”
McGee said contacting the DA and MDE quicker would be part of future protocols.
“Yeah, that definitely will be,” he said.
Zack Plair is the managing editor for The Dispatch.
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