DETROIT — The superintendent of Rochester Community Schools monitored the social media of parents who criticized the district and he and a deputy reported posts to at least two employers and one police department, the superintendent acknowledged in a deposition.
One of those parents was fired shortly after the district contacted her employer about a posting.
Superintendent Robert Shaner testified during a Feb. 3 deposition that he called one parent's employer, the Detroit Police Department, because he was "scared" by a social media post that called for protests outside private homes in March 2021. It was not clear to whose homes the post referred.
Shaner also acknowledged, under oath, that he called the police on a parent based on his belief that the woman had submitted a written threat to the district, although he admitted he never spoke with the woman.
The deposition was taken as part of a lawsuit filed in May and amended on Feb. 15 that accused Rochester school officials and staff of widespread monitoring and documenting of social media activity of parents the administration labeled as "protesters" because they demanded the reopening of schools.
Rochester Community Schools parent Elena Dinverno sued in May in U.S. District Court alleging she lost her job at Blake's Hard Cider in December 2020 after Board of Education President Kristin Bull called her employer to falsely claim Dinverno was participating in a group launching threats against the school district.
Dinverno has since changed the lawsuit to say RCS Deputy Superintendent Debra Fragomeni made the call.
The district, its attorneys and Shaner did not initially respond to messages left seeking comment for this story. Late Tuesday, however, the district reported that the lawsuit had been settled. The News could not confirm the settlement and no details were released.
Shaner during his deposition defended the district's action when asked if the district monitored parents' social media accounts.
"Yeah, we value the input of all parents, and we certainly want to keep our thumb on the pulse of the community, so we monitor social media very closely on all fronts and make sure we're responsive to the community," he told Deborah Gordon, Dinverno's attorney.
"Yeah, so again, I just want to be clear about the social media," he added. "We do watch it and try to make sure we know what's going on in our community, but that's not the only place that we get information on social media. Believe it or not, there are parents that support what we are doing, and they often share what's going on in social media with us as well..."
How the controversy emerged
The suit alleges several school officials monitored Facebook groups started by and comprised of parents in the district, including private Facebook groups. Officials also monitored the personal Facebook profiles of parents. Gordon said the district "did not advise parents or the community that their speech was being closely monitored and documented."
The Oakland County district stayed in remote learning from the fall of 2020 through the end of January 2021. It then offered families two learning options for the 2020-21 school year, in-person learning or virtual classes. In January 2021, the district opted for a phased-in approach as students returned to face-to-face instruction. Students enrolled in in-person learning returned to buildings full-time by March 1, 2021.
Specifically, the lawsuit alleges Amy DiCresce, the district's public affairs specialist, and Lori Grein, the district's spokeswoman, were assigned to regularly capture screenshots of district parents’ social media posts and comments which criticized the school district and to compile dossiers of the screenshots, which were circulated to administrators and school board members.
The dossiers included DiCresce and Grein’s notes containing personal information about district parents, such as their place of employment, the names of their children and which schools their children attended, according to Gordon.
"I have found at taxpayer expense they had high-level people spending hours monitoring parents' social posts," Gordon told The News. "I was stunned. I have a stack that is like a phone book. This was an active group that wanted their kids back in school."
If the social media posts were speech and not illegal conduct, they are protected under the Constitution, said legal expert William Wagner, president of the Lansing-based nonprofit group the Great Lakes Justice Center, who is not part of the lawsuit.
"Those are two different things. Speech is protected," Wagner said. "A true threat is threatening harm and is imminent."
Wagner said he has not heard of a school superintendent calling the employer of a parent over social media posts.
"This is the first I have heard of that," he said.
Parent Kimberly Bailiff said Shaner and other administrators connected to the allegations of monitoring social media should resign.
"Someone needs to be held accountable," Bailiff said. "The depth of the misconduct is hard to fathom. They all knew and not one person said, 'This isn’t right.'
"How do these people sleep at night? I think they think they are God. They have a carte blanche to do whatever it takes to shut everybody up."
Two calls to police
Shaner told Gordon he contacted the Detroit Police Department because a parent's Facebook posts "were aggressive and they mentioned that people should go to people's homes and protest. ... I took his language as aggressive, concerning."
Asked by Gordon why he called the man's employer, Shaner said, "Because I was concerned and scared."
Pressed further, Shaner said: "In front of people's homes. He was talking about putting pressure on people in their personal lives."
Shaner said he called the Detroit Police Department "downtown" and he said he thought he spoke to an assistant chief.
"I said I was concerned about his behavior and, from his Facebook post, what he does for a living with the department," Shaner told Gordon. "The assistant chief said she would look into it and contact their legal counsel."
Shaner said he heard back from the department official who told him, "they'd addressed it."
"And did his social media posting change?" Gordon asked.
"I don't recall if it changed or not. I assume it did," Shaner said.
In the second incident, Shaner explained to Gordon that he called a local chief of police about "a threat that I received that had (a parent's) name on it."
Shaner said the threat was a message that included the phrasing they're "going wreak havoc." Shaner said he did not contact the parent to inquire about what the statement meant, but rather called the police chief, whose name and department were not included in the deposition.
"I believe it was a(n) email, and I believe ... she denied doing it, so I don't know that I could say that it was a threat from her. I still don't know who it's a threat from. I'm not sure they ever determined where that came from," Shaner told Gordon.
A complaint, and a lost job
In her lawsuit, Dinverno describes herself as a "vocal and effective advocate for her position" who frequently "questioned and criticized" the decisions of the board through posts and comments in two Facebook groups: "RCS Parents for In-Person Education" and "Conservative Parents for Rochester."
Dinverno in the fall of 2020 asked for video testimonials from parents and students expressing the hardships they had endured without the availability of in-person school.
That prompted the call to Armada-based Blake's Hard Cider from the deputy superintendent, Fragomeni, according to her lawsuit.
On Nov. 6, 2020, Dinverno said she wrote a letter to Blake's leadership clarifying the extent of her participation in the Facebook groups. She said she had never made any threats and that her participation did not go beyond "passionate, and appropriate advocacy."
On Dec. 12, 2020 Dinverno submitted a comment to the board and administration through the district’s online feedback portal. She wrote that "every parent has the right to express their sadness, frustration, anger, as a right to freedom of speech" and "by reporting parents you are risking their livelihood. Their employment. That is all they have right now."
On Dec. 18, Dinverno was fired by Blake's, according to the suit.
The lawsuit alleges that the next month, on Jan. 11, 2021, before the school board meeting that evening, Grein sent about 165 pages of screenshots from parents’ social media activity to Fragomeni and Bull. Many of the screenshots contained discussions between parents regarding Dinverno’s Dec. 12 comment.
Dinverno, who has two children in the district, alleges Shaner and others unlawfully restricted her free speech.
In May, district officials denied the allegations, calling them "false and unfounded" but declined to discuss them further.
Attorneys for Dinverno say she engaged in constitutionally protected free speech and that the district unlawfully interfered with those rights by contacting and threatening her employer "with adverse professional ramifications."
The case is seeking damages for past and future economic and non-economic damages and an injunction against the district prohibiting further wrongdoing or retaliation against Dinverno.
Parent Korie Wilkins said there have been parents who’ve questioned the district and many of its communication practices and lack of transparency for years, including why teachers seemed to fear retaliation if they spoke up.
"It’s upsetting as a parent to think of district officials tracking your online activity — especially if, as it seems, they use some of that information to retaliate parents who dare to speak up,” Wilkins said.
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