8 Schools: Former Montgomery County school aide charged with abuse of 7-year-old

Police have accused a former school aide in Maryland of sexually abusing a female student who as a second-grader allegedly searched for candy in the aide’s pants pocket and touched his genitals.

Hector Hermes Lagos Toro, 58, was arrested and charged with sexual abuse of a minor and a third degree-sex offense for the alleged conduct at Stedwick Elementary School — the latest in a line of onetime Montgomery County school system employees accused of inappropriate contact with students.

Toro, who worked for the Montgomery County school system for more than a decade as a classroom aide and lunch-hour assistant, left the system in 2012 and is a longtime Spanish-language teacher at extracurricular foreign language programs across the county...

...Most recently, Toro worked as a Spanish-language instructor for before- and after-school foreign language programs run out of county elementary schools — one called FLES and the other, Foreign Language for Kids.

Since 2000, he worked with the FLES program operated by Big Learning, which was created by Montgomery’s countywide council of PTAs. This school year, he taught with FLES at Potomac Elementary and at Thurgood Marshall Elementary and Whetstone Elementary, both in Gaithersburg.

Since 2015, he also worked for Foreign Language for Kids, an educational company in Potomac, through which he taught at schools including Wilson Wims Elementary in Clarksburg, Carderock Springs Elementary in Bethesda and Seven Locks Elementary in Potomac.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/former-montgomery-county-school-aide-charged-with-abuse-of-7-year-old/2018/04/03/e41cc566-36cb-11e8-8fd2-49fe3c675a89_story.html?utm_term=.6ed2bf861512

Seven Locks ES: 300-Linear Foot Retaining Wall up to 9 Feet in Height

It's the hottest thing in MCPS new school construction! It's the Retaining Wall! 


As Superintendent Jerry Weast supersizes schools in Montgomery County he is increasingly using Retaining Walls to push construction to the edges of existing school sites.

We have shown you the 7 (yes, now 7) Retaining Walls coming to McKenney Hills ES, the extensive concrete walls at Francis Scott Key MS (one shown to left), the Cabin John MS "Wall" that has now been cut down after community protest, the walls at Parkland MS, and now we see that the Mandatory Referral report for the Seven Locks ES modernization underway also shows a significant Retaining Wall.

The location of the Retaining Wall at Seven Locks ES is shown in red on the diagram below. The report states that the Retaining Wall at the Seven Locks ES site will be a 300-linear foot retaining wall up to 9 feet in height.

From the Mandatory Referral Report (page 8):

Kennedy HS New Cell Tower Installations

The February 3, 2010 meeting minutes for the Transmission Facilities Coordinating Group shows the following entry:

Clearwire application to attach antennas on a 130' high monopole on JFK High School property, 1901 Randolph Road, Silver Spring (Application #200908-09). Condition: Submission of a structural analysis report to DPS and a copy to the Tower Coordinator that shows the antennas can be safely attached, and on Clearwire having a legal interest in the Public Schools property for attachment of these antennas

JFK High School would be John F. Kennedy High School. (Nice way to be transparent in the location!) According to these minutes this is for additional cell tower antennas to the Kennedy High School cell tower. Questions:

• Are these additional antennas being discussed in the Kennedy High School community like they were in the Whitman High School community? 
• Will the placement of these antennas get the media coverage like the Whitman cell tower issue?
• How much income will these additional antennas generate for the local school principal's fund and the MCPS real estate office?

Here's the BIG question. The meeting minutes note that Clearwire is being asked to show that they have a legal interest in the public schools property. Does Clearwire have a legal interest in this public school property? Good question!


How can Clearwire have a legal interest in the Public Schools property when the Board of Education has never signed over any property rights for the installation of cell towers? As we know from Board minutes the Board of Education has never voted on the placement of a cell tower on public school property in Montgomery County.  From Maryland Public Information Act requests we know that Superintendent Jerry Weast has been signing cell tower leases.


We look forward to obtaining and making available to the public the result of this inquiry by the Transmission Facilities Coordinating Group. We'd like to know too!  




And by the way, Seven Locks Elementary - you are getting a new cell tower right across the street from the school.