LAMB Sued for $20M by 2 families of sexual abuse victims

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:"it actually won't be fine. it's going to be litigated out of existence and that's tough for LAMB families to fathom. "

Among my cohort, it remains a very desirable school among those looking to enroll PK3ers. I don't see that changing. That's what I mean by reputation.

If the school is found liable and has to pay millions in awards to the victims' families, how much longer will it remain a desirable school? The school isn't sitting on a multi-million endowment, and it is leveraged up to its eyeballs with mortgages on its facilities.

Insurance will only cover so much. No one on this board knows how much the school's policies cover, or even whether Cottman and Encinas negotiated an agreement with the school to cover their personal legal expenses as part of a severance agreement.

The 'this will close the school' crowd is umping the gun a bit. I think there will be a slow decline. If your kids are already in -- you'll probably be able to ride it out. But will it still be around in 10 years? Not so sure.

[Anonymous]

Here's the latest publicly available annual report. You can try to figure out how their financial health.

Separately hat's fascinating in this document is that the school went through its re-accreditation and included their report. Board governance and communication was cited as an area needing improvement.

http://www.dcpcsb.org/sites/default/files/report/2015-2016%20Annual%20Report%28DSFC%29%28LatinAmericMontesBilingPCS%29.pdf

[Anonymous]

Based on the filing, it's tough to see how a jury won't find in favor of the plaintiffs. And this is only the first case. There will be others. Families have to find a way to pay for the lifetime of therapy. The key to LAMB's future is what that insurance policy looks like. What are its limits? What level of incompetence on part of the staff and Board would allow the insurer to deny the claim? As another PP mentioned, the filing is asking for $10M for EACH of the 12 counts. And with this sort of litigation hanging over the school how could their efforts to capture Kingbury actually happen?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:"it actually won't be fine. it's going to be litigated out of existence and that's tough for LAMB families to fathom. "

Among my cohort, it remains a very desirable school among those looking to enroll PK3ers. I don't see that changing. That's what I mean by reputation.

$100 says applications are at an all time high this year.

Of course they will be because LAMB continues to refuse to participate in the centralized lottery. So it never has to be one of your twelve picks...it gets to be an extra, #13 pick and it doesn't cost a penny to enter. So what would high application numbers mean exactly?

[Anonymous]

Parent of a victim here (I hate having to say that but I guess it gives my comments more cache.) Just wanted to address some of the comments I've read on here and clarify a few things...

Anonymous wrote:Holy crap. as the saying goes, no matter how flat you make a pancake, it has two sides. so obviously there lawsuit is one side, written with a lot of hindsight. But if even 20% of it is accurate, my god.

It’s 100% accurate.

Anonymous wrote:All of this rah-rah-we-are-such-a-strong-community is such a slap in the face to the victims and their families.

Personally, I don’t think so. It’s the community that is partly helping me keep my shit together.

Anonymous wrote:LAMB families who can’t handle the understandable reactions from observers that there must be something fundamentally broken at their school need to step away from threads like this. Telling people they can’t have opinions or to “stop talking” is pretty telling. It screams “nothing to see here” which is precisely the attitude that allowed this tradedy to happen. Most parents get it. You have sent your child to a school so you have to believe it’s a good place, a good environment otherwise you’re a bad parent. So you have to convince yourself that you’re doing right by your kid. And I’m sure Lamb does have a strong community and committed teachers but you’re being naive to assume it will be able weather the storm of lawsuits it’s about to get hit by. Insurance has limits.

I think any LAMB families who are still under the impression that nothing is broken at the school are the ones who have had their head in the sand and probably wouldn’t be on this thread anyway. Families are WELL aware that something is fundamentally broken. It’s just that they are choosing to face the music and try to fix it instead of running away. And yes, I do feel guilty for not seeing what was happening. Am I a bad parent? Sometimes I think so. But in my heart I know I’m not. And I still think I’m doing right by my kids by sending them to LAMB.

Anonymous wrote:The lamb community is trying to weather this storm
Translation:
We are trying to brush this under the rug and move on as quickly as possible so we can pretend like it didn't happen.

Not true. See above.

Anonymous wrote:Parents who are so defensive of LAMB and the actions of the leadership are probably feeling guilty for keeping their kids in a school that sweeps sexual abuse under the rug.

Or they have no idea what was/is going on. Those that do, aren’t defensive.

Anonymous wrote:In reading #92 I was so dismayed that the administration allowed a meeting occur where an apparently unqualified staff member talked to the students (without parents present) and stressed secrecy. WTF?!??!

It was actually a school counselor. A PhD in psychology. And she was fired. WTF is right.

Anonymous wrote:It can and will happen anywhere, but I think it will especially happen in places that lack a professional work environment because the principal or head is also the founder who thinks of the school has his/hers and is personal friends with the teachers. I assume that the teacher was allowed to continue because the head/principal thought he was a great guy who would never do such a thing. We they personal friends? It is hard in a work environment, but as a boss, you want to be friends but still have a critical distance from employees so that you can fire someone when rules are broken (basement play) even if you think them a great guy.

They were/are(?) really good friends. Too good of friends. It totally clouded their judgment.

Anonymous wrote:It's really sad how a handful of LAMB supporters are misdirecting their anger and sorrow on this board at people who have taken the time to read the filing and are responding to the catastrophic failings that they read about.

The problem though is there is so much more to know than what is in that filing and people are talking as if they know everything when they really don’t.

Anonymous wrote:The school isn't sitting on a multi-million endowment, and it is leveraged up to its eyeballs with mortgages on its facilities.

No it isn’t - it rents two of the three campuses.

Anonymous wrote:Based on the filing, it's tough to see how a jury won't find in favor of the plaintiffs.

I’d be REALLY surprised if this even made it to trial.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Parent of a victim here (I hate having to say that but I guess it gives my comments more cache.) Just wanted to address some of the comments I've read on here and clarify a few things...

Anonymous wrote:Holy crap. as the saying goes, no matter how flat you make a pancake, it has two sides. so obviously there lawsuit is one side, written with a lot of hindsight. But if even 20% of it is accurate, my god.

It’s 100% accurate.

Anonymous wrote:All of this rah-rah-we-are-such-a-strong-community is such a slap in the face to the victims and their families.

Personally, I don’t think so. It’s the community that is partly helping me keep my shit together.

Anonymous wrote:LAMB families who can’t handle the understandable reactions from observers that there must be something fundamentally broken at their school need to step away from threads like this. Telling people they can’t have opinions or to “stop talking” is pretty telling. It screams “nothing to see here” which is precisely the attitude that allowed this tradedy to happen. Most parents get it. You have sent your child to a school so you have to believe it’s a good place, a good environment otherwise you’re a bad parent. So you have to convince yourself that you’re doing right by your kid. And I’m sure Lamb does have a strong community and committed teachers but you’re being naive to assume it will be able weather the storm of lawsuits it’s about to get hit by. Insurance has limits.

I think any LAMB families who are still under the impression that nothing is broken at the school are the ones who have had their head in the sand and probably wouldn’t be on this thread anyway. Families are WELL aware that something is fundamentally broken. It’s just that they are choosing to face the music and try to fix it instead of running away. And yes, I do feel guilty for not seeing what was happening. Am I a bad parent? Sometimes I think so. But in my heart I know I’m not. And I still think I’m doing right by my kids by sending them to LAMB.

Anonymous wrote:The lamb community is trying to weather this storm
Translation:
We are trying to brush this under the rug and move on as quickly as possible so we can pretend like it didn't happen.

Not true. See above.

Anonymous wrote:Parents who are so defensive of LAMB and the actions of the leadership are probably feeling guilty for keeping their kids in a school that sweeps sexual abuse under the rug.

Or they have no idea what was/is going on. Those that do, aren’t defensive.

Anonymous wrote:In reading #92 I was so dismayed that the administration allowed a meeting occur where an apparently unqualified staff member talked to the students (without parents present) and stressed secrecy. WTF?!??!

It was actually a school counselor. A PhD in psychology. And she was fired. WTF is right.

Anonymous wrote:It can and will happen anywhere, but I think it will especially happen in places that lack a professional work environment because the principal or head is also the founder who thinks of the school has his/hers and is personal friends with the teachers. I assume that the teacher was allowed to continue because the head/principal thought he was a great guy who would never do such a thing. We they personal friends? It is hard in a work environment, but as a boss, you want to be friends but still have a critical distance from employees so that you can fire someone when rules are broken (basement play) even if you think them a great guy.

They were/are(?) really good friends. Too good of friends. It totally clouded their judgment.

Anonymous wrote:It's really sad how a handful of LAMB supporters are misdirecting their anger and sorrow on this board at people who have taken the time to read the filing and are responding to the catastrophic failings that they read about.

The problem though is there is so much more to know than what is in that filing and people are talking as if they know everything when they really don’t.

Anonymous wrote:The school isn't sitting on a multi-million endowment, and it is leveraged up to its eyeballs with mortgages on its facilities.

No it isn’t - it rents two of the three campuses.

Anonymous wrote:Based on the filing, it's tough to see how a jury won't find in favor of the plaintiffs.

I’d be REALLY surprised if this even made it to trial.

Thank you for taking the time to comment. So much uninformed yammer on this board, I swear. I guess people can't help tue rubbernecking.

One thing, though, I've not yet understood: who was counsel to the directors during all this (2015 especially)? Or did they counsel themselves? To me all the secrecy is odd and the not telling parents; were they really just trying to protect their friend, or, didn't they ask for some legal advice? Or even advice from police what to disclose to whom? If not, that's crazy to me. There should be some caution when no cause for arrest is found (in case it really had been nothing, say) but that should be under advisement of some kind of legal team, I would hope.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Parent of a victim here (I hate having to say that but I guess it gives my comments more cache.) Just wanted to address some of the comments I've read on here and clarify a few things...

Anonymous wrote:Holy crap. as the saying goes, no matter how flat you make a pancake, it has two sides. so obviously there lawsuit is one side, written with a lot of hindsight. But if even 20% of it is accurate, my god.

It’s 100% accurate.

Anonymous wrote:All of this rah-rah-we-are-such-a-strong-community is such a slap in the face to the victims and their families.

Personally, I don’t think so. It’s the community that is partly helping me keep my shit together.

Anonymous wrote:LAMB families who can’t handle the understandable reactions from observers that there must be something fundamentally broken at their school need to step away from threads like this. Telling people they can’t have opinions or to “stop talking” is pretty telling. It screams “nothing to see here” which is precisely the attitude that allowed this tradedy to happen. Most parents get it. You have sent your child to a school so you have to believe it’s a good place, a good environment otherwise you’re a bad parent. So you have to convince yourself that you’re doing right by your kid. And I’m sure Lamb does have a strong community and committed teachers but you’re being naive to assume it will be able weather the storm of lawsuits it’s about to get hit by. Insurance has limits.

I think any LAMB families who are still under the impression that nothing is broken at the school are the ones who have had their head in the sand and probably wouldn’t be on this thread anyway. Families are WELL aware that something is fundamentally broken. It’s just that they are choosing to face the music and try to fix it instead of running away. And yes, I do feel guilty for not seeing what was happening. Am I a bad parent? Sometimes I think so. But in my heart I know I’m not. And I still think I’m doing right by my kids by sending them to LAMB.

Anonymous wrote:The lamb community is trying to weather this storm
Translation:
We are trying to brush this under the rug and move on as quickly as possible so we can pretend like it didn't happen.

Not true. See above.

Anonymous wrote:Parents who are so defensive of LAMB and the actions of the leadership are probably feeling guilty for keeping their kids in a school that sweeps sexual abuse under the rug.

Or they have no idea what was/is going on. Those that do, aren’t defensive.

Anonymous wrote:In reading #92 I was so dismayed that the administration allowed a meeting occur where an apparently unqualified staff member talked to the students (without parents present) and stressed secrecy. WTF?!??!

It was actually a school counselor. A PhD in psychology. And she was fired. WTF is right.

Anonymous wrote:It can and will happen anywhere, but I think it will especially happen in places that lack a professional work environment because the principal or head is also the founder who thinks of the school has his/hers and is personal friends with the teachers. I assume that the teacher was allowed to continue because the head/principal thought he was a great guy who would never do such a thing. We they personal friends? It is hard in a work environment, but as a boss, you want to be friends but still have a critical distance from employees so that you can fire someone when rules are broken (basement play) even if you think them a great guy.

They were/are(?) really good friends. Too good of friends. It totally clouded their judgment.

Anonymous wrote:It's really sad how a handful of LAMB supporters are misdirecting their anger and sorrow on this board at people who have taken the time to read the filing and are responding to the catastrophic failings that they read about.

The problem though is there is so much more to know than what is in that filing and people are talking as if they know everything when they really don’t.

Anonymous wrote:The school isn't sitting on a multi-million endowment, and it is leveraged up to its eyeballs with mortgages on its facilities.

No it isn’t - it rents two of the three campuses.

Anonymous wrote:Based on the filing, it's tough to see how a jury won't find in favor of the plaintiffs.

I’d be REALLY surprised if this even made it to trial.

Thank you for taking the time to respond. I too agree that it isn't likely to go to trial. They will settle -- but this is just the beginning of the lawsuits. Many others will come especially after the families know the Board has the report.

About the bolded is that the psychologist who was allowed to leave Dec. 15? It doesn't seem like a firing at all. I think that is what I find most concerning. The letter to parents was in Nov, I assume the Board received the report in Nov and still no one was fired. It seems as though two were allowed to resign and one is still employed by the school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Parent of a victim here (I hate having to say that but I guess it gives my comments more cache.) Just wanted to address some of the comments I've read on here and clarify a few things...

Anonymous wrote:Holy crap. as the saying goes, no matter how flat you make a pancake, it has two sides. so obviously there lawsuit is one side, written with a lot of hindsight. But if even 20% of it is accurate, my god.

It’s 100% accurate.

Anonymous wrote:All of this rah-rah-we-are-such-a-strong-community is such a slap in the face to the victims and their families.

Personally, I don’t think so. It’s the community that is partly helping me keep my shit together.

Anonymous wrote:LAMB families who can’t handle the understandable reactions from observers that there must be something fundamentally broken at their school need to step away from threads like this. Telling people they can’t have opinions or to “stop talking” is pretty telling. It screams “nothing to see here” which is precisely the attitude that allowed this tradedy to happen. Most parents get it. You have sent your child to a school so you have to believe it’s a good place, a good environment otherwise you’re a bad parent. So you have to convince yourself that you’re doing right by your kid. And I’m sure Lamb does have a strong community and committed teachers but you’re being naive to assume it will be able weather the storm of lawsuits it’s about to get hit by. Insurance has limits.

I think any LAMB families who are still under the impression that nothing is broken at the school are the ones who have had their head in the sand and probably wouldn’t be on this thread anyway. Families are WELL aware that something is fundamentally broken. It’s just that they are choosing to face the music and try to fix it instead of running away. And yes, I do feel guilty for not seeing what was happening. Am I a bad parent? Sometimes I think so. But in my heart I know I’m not. And I still think I’m doing right by my kids by sending them to LAMB.

Anonymous wrote:The lamb community is trying to weather this storm
Translation:
We are trying to brush this under the rug and move on as quickly as possible so we can pretend like it didn't happen.

Not true. See above.

Anonymous wrote:Parents who are so defensive of LAMB and the actions of the leadership are probably feeling guilty for keeping their kids in a school that sweeps sexual abuse under the rug.

Or they have no idea what was/is going on. Those that do, aren’t defensive.

Anonymous wrote:In reading #92 I was so dismayed that the administration allowed a meeting occur where an apparently unqualified staff member talked to the students (without parents present) and stressed secrecy. WTF?!??!

It was actually a school counselor. A PhD in psychology. And she was fired. WTF is right.

Anonymous wrote:It can and will happen anywhere, but I think it will especially happen in places that lack a professional work environment because the principal or head is also the founder who thinks of the school has his/hers and is personal friends with the teachers. I assume that the teacher was allowed to continue because the head/principal thought he was a great guy who would never do such a thing. We they personal friends? It is hard in a work environment, but as a boss, you want to be friends but still have a critical distance from employees so that you can fire someone when rules are broken (basement play) even if you think them a great guy.

They were/are(?) really good friends. Too good of friends. It totally clouded their judgment.

Anonymous wrote:It's really sad how a handful of LAMB supporters are misdirecting their anger and sorrow on this board at people who have taken the time to read the filing and are responding to the catastrophic failings that they read about.

The problem though is there is so much more to know than what is in that filing and people are talking as if they know everything when they really don’t.

Anonymous wrote:The school isn't sitting on a multi-million endowment, and it is leveraged up to its eyeballs with mortgages on its facilities.

No it isn’t - it rents two of the three campuses.

Anonymous wrote:Based on the filing, it's tough to see how a jury won't find in favor of the plaintiffs.

I’d be REALLY surprised if this even made it to trial.

Thank you for taking the time to respond. I too agree that it isn't likely to go to trial. They will settle -- but this is just the beginning of the lawsuits. Many others will come especially after the families know the Board has the report.

About the bolded is that the psychologist who was allowed to leave Dec. 15? It doesn't seem like a firing at all. I think that is what I find most concerning. The letter to parents was in Nov, I assume the Board received the report in Nov and still no one was fired. It seems as though two were allowed to resign and one is still employed by the school.

No, I believe the Board received the report and immediately fired both the psychologist and principal. With perhaps two weeks notice? Not sure. And asked the ED to resign at the end of the school year.

[Anonymous]

I guess our ideas of "firing" are different. In my book if you are fired you leave immediately. Not two weeks later or at the end of the year. Does it seem odd to you that the ED is still there?

[Anonymous]

Thank you for taking the time to comment. So much uninformed yammer on this board, I swear. I guess people can't help tue rubbernecking.

One thing, though, I've not yet understood: who was counsel to the directors during all this (2015 especially)? Or did they counsel themselves? To me all the secrecy is odd and the not telling parents; were they really just trying to protect their friend, or, didn't they ask for some legal advice? Or even advice from police what to disclose to whom? If not, that's crazy to me. There should be some caution when no cause for arrest is found (in case it really had been nothing, say) but that should be under advisement of some kind of legal team, I would hope.

I honestly don't know for sure who they were seeking counsel from at the time, but based on how they have behaved in the past and since all this happened, my money is on NO ONE. They kept it close to their chest and tried to protect their "family". Based on the Board's summary of their internal report, they were not informed about most, if any, of it. Diane and Cristina do not like to be given suggestions on what to do. From anyone. They were never good at communication and from my point of view, it was deliberate.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Thank you for taking the time to respond. I too agree that it isn't likely to go to trial. They will settle -- but this is just the beginning of the lawsuits. Many others will come especially after the families know the Board has the report.

About the bolded is that the psychologist who was allowed to leave Dec. 15? It doesn't seem like a firing at all. I think that is what I find most concerning. The letter to parents was in Nov, I assume the Board received the report in Nov and still no one was fired. It seems as though two were allowed to resign and one is still employed by the school.

Who knows if more will come. It's expensive to hire a lawyer and file a lawsuit. A lot of families of victims would rather just move on.

Yes, she was fired. I consider it fired if you didn't want to leave and you are told you have to. Yes, Diane is still there, but we are told only in the capacity to help with the transition to a new ED. There is a contingent of parents though that will argue for her to be gone NOW. I wanted her gone when this was first announced.

[Anonymous]

I'm sorry that happened to your family

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm sorry that happened to your family

Thank you.

[Anonymous]

And also you are not a bad parent.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:And also you are not a bad parent.

That part kills me too. The quotes from the sentencing hearing from the families.....ugh. The father saying he was worried about letting his child walk a few blocks to school but had no idea the danger from being in the school. Heartbreaking. These are not bad parents at all.