Edward N. Cahn Federal Building and United States Courthouse
ALLENTOWN, Pa. – A Pennsylvania boarding school will defend itself against claims it knew or should have known a choir director was grooming and eventually groped a teenage girl during a trial scheduled to begin Monday.
Pine Forge Academy, a Seventh-day Adventist school in Berks County, is accused of aiding grooming allegedly conducted close to 20 years ago by Jason Max Ferdinand, who is now the director of choral activities at the University of Maryland. Ferdinand was not named as a defendant in the case, which made it to trial in only 14 months.
Allentown federal judge John Gallagher has issued a series of decisions on what can be told to jurors who will be selected Friday. To try to prove Pine Forge knew of inappropriate relationships between teachers and students, plaintiff Jane Doe’s attorneys attempted to submit testimony of two former students.
But the alleged incidents went unreported, leading the evidence to not concern what the school knew or should have known but what it “could have known,” Gallagher wrote in rejecting one witness and limiting what another can say.
“Rather, it is one possible step on a potential path of what Defendants could have come to know,” he added.
“It is also too speculative because it requires an assumption that the kiss and inappropriate communications would have been revealed to Defendants had they had taken certain investigative steps with the information they did have.”
Jane Doe similarly did not report her alleged interactions with Ferdinand. She alleges she was groomed when Ferdinand featured her in the choir, texted her, sat with her on bus trips and drove with her to events when the bus was full.
She also alleges he held her hand and had her unpack and iron his clothing in his hotel room during choir trips. Staff at Pine Forge are alleged to have seen this behavior and failed to act, and Ferdinand is alleged to have touched “her private parts under her clothing with his hand,” the lawsuit says.
In a July 17 order, Gallagher sided with Pine Forge on its request to tell jurors that Jane Doe did not report the alleged contact with police, as it shows that the school could not have been informed through that avenue. However, the fact that there was no police report could also show the defendants failed to notify authorities of criminal conduct they were aware of.
Jane Doe will be able to introduce expert opinions from Adrienne Isom Malin and William Bainbridge. Isom Malin investigated child sexual abuse while at the FBI and was involved in actions against the Catholic church, though Gallagher limited some of what she can tell the jury.
“The abuse in the Catholic Church is a fair point of reference for explaining the witness’s experience and the opinions she reaches in the case, but suggesting the conduct of Defendants is comparable to the Catholic Church in this direct, inflammatory manner is a step too far,” he wrote.
Isom Malin will be presented as an expert on grooming, while Bainbridge will testify to Jane Doe’s negligent hiring claim.
