{"id":10557,"date":"2017-03-07T01:54:13","date_gmt":"2017-03-07T06:54:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.shorebeat.com\/brick\/?p=10557"},"modified":"2017-03-07T10:34:37","modified_gmt":"2017-03-07T15:34:37","slug":"document-allegations-from-fired-bus-driver-led-to-investigation-of-brick-superintendent","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/2017\/03\/document-allegations-from-fired-bus-driver-led-to-investigation-of-brick-superintendent\/","title":{"rendered":"Document: Allegations From Fired Bus Driver Led to Investigation of Brick Superintendent"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Walter<\/a>

Walter Uszenski (File Photo)<\/p><\/div>An investigation into suspended Brick schools superintendent Walter Uszenski was initiated\u00a0after a school bus driver who lost her job when\u00a0she left a child on a bus provided information to Mayor John Ducey about the case, a document produced by the Ocean County Prosecutor\u2019s Office and obtained by Shorebeat said.<\/p>\n

The document, an investigation report narrative written by a detective from the prosecutor\u2019s office, said Ducey met with Prosecutor Joseph D. Coronato only after the probationary bus driver, identified as Marcella Butterly, went to his office and made the allegations, some\u00a0of which have now been proven false, according to court documents and sources with knowledge of the case.<\/p>\n

\u201cMs. Butterly stated that she was covering a route for another driver who had called out sick,\u201d the narrative states. \u201cWhile covering the route, Ms. Butterly had inadvertently left a child on the bus who should have been dropped off at the Educational Enrichment Center \u2026 Ms Butterly defended herself to Mayor Ducey by stating that the child fell asleep on the bus and, prior to conducting a check of the seats, she was asked to drive the Brick Township School District superintendent\u2019s grandson to a private day care facility located\u00a0in Beachwood.\u201d<\/p>\n

Uszenski\u2019s grandson was, in fact, attending a private facility on Princeton Avenue in Brick \u2013 not Beachwood \u2013 and, according to sources, the EEC building was not being used for classes at the time of the incident because of a mold issue. Last week, an indictment\u00a0alleging Uszenski \u2013 who remains suspended from his position without pay \u2013 commited a crime by allowing the grandson to attend the private school was dismissed by Superior Court Judge Patricia Roe<\/a>, who was critical of prosecutors for failing to\u00a0include exculpatory evidence a grand jury presentation.<\/p>\n

Sources also confirmed\u00a0Butterly was terminated from her position after the incident. She was a probationary driver at the time it occurred, records showed<\/a>, having been hired in Feb. 2014.<\/p>\n

\"An<\/a>

An excerpt of an investigative report produced by the Ocean County Prosecutor\u2019s Office. (Credit: Source)<\/p><\/div>Ducey said Monday that he only relayed information to the prosecutor\u2019s office that\u00a0the driver told him, a fact which the report confirmed.<\/p>\n

\u201cMayor Ducey advised that he did not question Ms. Butterly about the transportation of the purported grandson of the superintendent,\u201d the narrative states.<\/p>\n

Ducey spoke to a Shorebeat reporter on the matter Monday.<\/p>\n

\u201cOnce she told me those facts, I had an obligation, in my mind to go to the prosecutor\u2019s office,\u201d Ducey said, adding that his decision to take the matter directly to the prosecutor was an example of \u201cfollowing the right channels.\u201d He said he did not inform authorities of any allegations besides what the driver, now identified as Butterly, told him.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m assuming they took my information and investigated it,\u201d said Ducey.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf this did turn\u00a0out to be true, and I didn\u2019t relay it, then they\u2019d be saying I was part of some coverup,\u201d Ducey added.<\/p>\n

A woman who answered a phone number associated with Butterly initially told a reporter she believed the call was a prank from an old friend, eventually hanging up. The woman, who never identified herself, called back about 15 minutes later to ask the reporter what question he had about a meeting with Ducey. She declined to identify herself, then called the question \u201cbizarre\u201d before hanging up the phone a second time.<\/p>\n

The prosecutor\u2019s office has yet to decide whether it plans on presenting the case to a grand jury for a third time. Uszenski has retained a labor attorney in addition to his defense attorney to receive advice on how to proceed. Uszenski has more than a year left of his five-year superintendent\u2019s contract, which expires June 30, 2018.<\/p>\n

<\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

An investigation into suspended Brick schools superintendent Walter Uszenski was initiated\u00a0after a school bus driver who lost her job when\u00a0she left a child on a bus provided information to Mayor John Ducey about the case, a document produced by the Ocean County Prosecutor\u2019s Office and obtained by Shorebeat said. The document, an investigation report narrative […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":10559,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":true,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[3,13],"tags":[24,2789,131,2791,2790,1281],"class_list":["post-10557","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-police-fire-courts","category-brick-schools","tag-brick-nj-news","tag-bus-driver","tag-indictment","tag-investigation","tag-marcella-butterly","tag-walter-uszenski"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/03\/usz_bus.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pgt2Ft-2Kh","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10557","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10557"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10557\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10559"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10557"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10557"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.shorebeat.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10557"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}