The worst phone call ever

I will never see April Fools Day as a day of jokes or fun again.
It will always be ingrained in my memory as the day I received the Worst Phone Call Ever.

I was at work, meeting with a student when one of our student Office Assistants came into my office (they never walk in when I'm meeting with a student) and said, "Amanda, I'm sorry to interrupt, but Dr. Jason Pina, the Vice President of the University is on the phone for you - and he said I needed to interrupt you and you needed to take this phone call."

I have a decent relationship with Jason, (he's my boss's boss's boss) and last year we ran a Marathon Relay together with another guy from work and Ryan.  He and Ryan spent an hour together just chatting it up and I've been able to talk with him a lot about running (he's run a bunch of marathons and has a very sarcastic personality that I enjoy).

I wasn't nervous when he called - although, he's never told my OA that I need to take his call, I just figured I might have been the only person from the management team in the office which is why he wanted me.

Well, that was not the case.

"Hello friend.." I said, as I always do when I know who is on the other line.
"Hi Amanda, I'm sorry I had to interrupt you - are you alone, can you speak privately."
"Yes, what's going on?"  still thinking this was going to be about a student.
"I'm sorry to have to call for this, but I wanted to let you know that one of the Student Teachers at the Children's Center (Isabella's pre-school) was just arrested and is going to be arraigned for digitally raping two students at the center.  At this point, we know that the two students were boys and he is in custody now.
Are you still there?"
"I'm here.  Ok, thank you for letting me know."
"Ok, we are going to have a meeting tomorrow night for all parents on campus and I want to give you the number for an advocacy group."
"Wait, do you know if he was in Isabella's classroom?  Was he one of her student teachers?"  And now the images of Izzy crying and begging me not to make her go to school each morning start flooding my head and I immediately start sweating profusely.  My knees start to shake and I can feel my stomach on fire, and I know I'm about to vomit.
"I don't know, and I'm so sorry I don't know.  We are at the point right now where this arrest was just done and I am calling all parents.  Our plan is to compile all of that information for parents as soon as we can."
"Jason, Izzy hates school - is this why?"
"I am so sorry, but I don't know.  I don't have many answers, I just really wanted to make sure you knew this from me."
"Oh my goodness, you have to call all of the parents - I'm really sorry Jason - I appreciate you calling me though, as much as this sucks for you, I'm really glad it's you."  And it hits me, he's going to get some really pissed off parents.
"thank you.  Do you need anything from me at this time?"  And I knew he needed to end the phone call to keep calling parents.
"No, thank you.  Good luck with the other calls."

And the tears began.
I need to tell Ryan - but Ryan has Maddie in the car and for once, I hate the bluetooth technology in our car.
But I can't wait to tell him until the girls go to bed - I know he'll know something is up.
So I called him and told him to take the phone off of blue tooth.
Clearly, his end of the conversation was all "Oh, ok.  Uh huh.  Ok, well thanks for sharing that" and other pleasantries so that Maddie wouldn't know anything was up.

My boss came in and very flippantly said, "Oh, yeah, did you hear? It's on the news now, all over the news and facebook."  I want to think that she forgot that Izzy was a student there when she first said this, because it was just so careless - and then I broke down in tears on her - and I think it hit her.  Just how rude it was that she was so flip about it when I was panicking over it.  I was supposed to go to an Alumni Employee dinner that night, but needed to go home and see my girls- I needed to figure out how to now if Isabella had been touched or witnessed anything.  I needed someone to make me feel better about her hating school and I needed to somehow know that it had nothing to do with this.  I prayed. I begged God - I pleaded with Him.  Please let my baby be untouched - literally by this monster.

Immediately my phone started blowing up.  My mom called while I was on the phone with Ryan and left a message saying, "Amanda, please tell me I didn't just hear what I think I heard on the news".  Becky called, "Amanda, call me immediately, I'm freaking out."
And then the texts started - I think I received over 200 texts on a two hour period asking if I was ok, if I knew anything.  At one point, I just turned my phone off because Maddie was picking up on something.  "Mumma, is something going on?  Is everything ok?"  I played it off easy, and then needed to move to get the stress out - so I played Just Dance with the girls for at least an hour!

(I'm leaving a significant part out of this story (as I'm not sure what information people will read and I don't want to get anyone involved or share anything that might be brought up later- it involves Isabella's teacher and I'll just say that she is amazing and assured me that Izzy was safe).  I wont lie, this made me feel much better, but I still worried and had normal fear, I think.

At one point at home, I went to the bathroom and looked online on my phone and the media had put a picture of the creep on sites everywhere.  I came out of the bathroom and told Ryan, "I think I want to show Izzy his picture to see how she reacts."  He agreed that we should and while Maddie was outside playing with the boys next door, I said, "Izzy, I want to show you a picture of someone you might know.  He works at your school."
"Ok, where is he?"
So I paused the clip on my phone at the point where they showed his picture and said, "His name is Kyle, do you know him?"
"Does he talk?"  was her question.  She knew it was a video about to play and was waiting for the "movie".
"Well, not on here, but in your school he probably talks, do you know him?"
"yeah" she said shyly?
"You do, does he talk to you?  At your school?"  I asked, watching for some reaction, because up until this point there was really no visible reaction at all and she was still just waiting to watch a video!!
"No"
"You don't know him?  Have you ever seen him at school?  His name is Kyle."
"No, I don't know him.  What are we having for dinner?  Is it almost time to eat?"

And that was it.
Ryan was standing in the doorway watching the whole interaction and shook his head, as if to say, "No, she really doesn't know him."

She's only been in the pre-school since March 2nd.  And the fact that the two victims were boys - somehow offered me comfort.  I know that's awful, but at that point, it is the truth.

This post would be insanely long if I went through the following weeks with you - so I will try to cut it short.  I went to the parent meeting (Ryan's parents watched the kids so we could both attend) and it lasted over 3 hours.
Parents were pissed.  They were screaming, shouting, swearing at the President of the University.  Screaming at the chief of Police.  I think the administrators thought that parents would just be so happy that he was caught and arrested, but that was not the case.  Parents were pissed.  Many were pissed because they heard from the media before they got Jason's phone call.  I felt guilty at one point because I knew I was Jason's first phone call and I took a lot of his time.

When parents were so pissed and yelling at the lawyers there and the district attorneys that had come to help, the President finally kicked all of the college administrators out of the room and leveled with parents.  See, the chief and lawyers couldn't disclose ANY information without messing with the integrity of the case - so they were just trying to talk at us.  It wasn't working.  So the President needed to save it.  He's leaving in June, so really, he didn't have much to lose by doing this.  He shut the others out and told us pretty much all he knew.  Parents calmed down a bit.  He said, "Listen, I know what you're going through - I understand how much this sucks" and one parent screamed out "You have?  You had to worry that your child was raped!?" and he said, "Yes, I have - and it sucks" and he started choking up.
Once he said that - parents went a little easier on him.

It has taken everything I have not to comment on the news articles and Facebook posts about this.  People don't know the facts.  They assume that teachers are to blame.  They assume that this happened and teachers failed to report it.
The fact of the matter is that the teachers' response to this probably saved a multitude of kids from the same actions - and certainly saved this kid from doing it in the future.  His plan and course was to open his own daycare center.  Can you even imagine?
The teachers reported a lot - but nothing they saw was abuse, neglect, or endangerment.  Because he was crafty - and as all predators and child molesters do, he did what he wanted.
The teachers reported to their director that he was creepy.  That they didn't like the way he looked at the children (that isn't something that you can report to DCF).  They reported that they felt uncomfortable around him - to which she told them they were being unfair to a student with a disability.  She even challenged their biases and said that if it were a female student teacher, they wouldn't be complaining the way they were.  (This creep is legally blind, so he has those thick glasses and yes, is naturally creepy).  But these teachers reported feelings that they had and things that they saw that should have been supported and wasn't.
When there was finally something that could be reported to the state - the teacher that told the director basically risked her job to make sure that it was handled properly even though she didn't feel her other complaints were supported.  These teachers are phenomenal and they care so much for their kids.
Let me tell you - If I reported everyone that I felt was a creep, I'd have a file as thick as an encyclopedia and I'm sure people would tell me that I was stereotyping, and then I'm sure I would second guess myself.
These teachers, even after being made to feel like they were being biased, did what they could to keep this kid away from the students (at the risk of their director throwing disciplinary action at them) because they believed their gut.
That's the kind of teacher I want.  One that doesn't need proof, but just feels like something isn't right, so they keep my child safe from the person.  That's what happened.  None of those teachers had any idea that the "digital rapes" happened.  Let's be honest, even if you get a creepy vibe from someone, no matter how odd they seem, you can't ever actually imagine that they would DO something like this.  But they did sense that his behavior and thoughts were off - so they gave him administrative work to do and wouldn't let him near the kids.  Even though their director told them they shouldn't do that - if she wasn't going to fire him - they were going to make sure that he wasn't around the kids.

Anyway, I digress because I said I wouldn't make this a long post - sorry!
I have so much more to say about this - about the center.
I'm currently involved a group of parents that work with the President and other administrators to make sure that the Children's Center is the best center it can be.  I'm one of 38 families (out of 49) that continue to send their children to the center even after this happened.

I also, should mention that I would have called the director, Judy, my friend prior to this happening.  So, lets just say that I have MANY mixed, confused, and scary feelings about this whole situation.

I will end by saying, I hope NONE of my friends ever have to receive a phone call like that one.