Charges Against Band Director Detail History of Alleged Misconduct

Bridgewater-Raritan High School band director Larry Markiewicz has been charged with "conduct unbecoming of a teaching staff member," among other charges, according to the official paperwork filed with the New Jersey Department of Education.

Superintendent of Schools Michael Schilder, in the paperwork, also charged Markiewicz with "insubordination and/or other just cause warranting dismissal and reduction in salary."

Markiewicz, who has been with the school since 2000, was suspended with pay in March pending an investigation by the superintendent. After initially submitting charges in May, the board of education officially filed them with the Commissioner of Education Tuesday.

The commissioner will now determine whether Markiewicz will be allowed to return to the school.

According to the documents filed, Markiewicz has a total of 11 individual charges against him based on incidents reaching back to 2004, including engaging in misconduct toward a student; exhibiting disregard for the health and well-being of a student; engaging in misconduct toward a former student that caused him to skip class and withdraw; engaging in misconduct toward a former student that caused her to have panic attacks; and divulging confidential information about one student to another.

The latest charge, according to the documents, stems from a February 2013 incident in which Markiewicz allegedly distributed a statement to members of the Monday Jazz Band that singled out one particular student.

According to the documents, a student was interested in joining a sports team, requiring him to miss time with the band. Markiewicz, the documents said, allegedly explained that there would be consequences if he joined the sports team in an effort to threaten and pressure him to remain fully committed to the band.

Markiewicz also allegedly said he would interfere with the student’s chances of making the sports team itself.

The letter given to members of the jazz band, the documents said, also identified the student and implied that the ability of the band to compete would be compromised by the student leaving the band to pursue the sport.

The documents continue that in September 2011, Markiewicz had been reprimanded for similar treatment of students and told that disciplinary action would be taken if it happened again, with the possibility for his dismissal from the school.

Also included in the documents is a charge that Markiewicz allegedly interfered with another student’s desire to participate in activities that would take him away from the band, using “profane language” and having “violent outbursts” with regard to the student’s performance in the band and desire to participate in sports.

As for the charge concerning the health of students, the documents allege that Markiewicz told students they could not miss practice prior to nationals during the 2010-2011 year—one student allegedly was afraid of retaliatory actions and refused to miss practice to visit a doctor for examination of a rash she had developed.

Most of the charges, according to the documents, center on what witnesses described as “verbally abusive behavior, including berating individuals loudly and insultingly in class.”

Other reports from prior students, as quoted in the documents, allege that they witnessed Markiewicz’s violent outbursts, with one former student saying she saw his “completely inappropriate, outrageously hostile and verbally abusive behavior which included, but was not limited to him yelling, screaming and cursing in class; throwing things;” and more.

All of these incidents, according to the documents, led to the charges against Markiewicz.

“The acts of misconduct set forth in the foregoing Charges and Counts, jointly and severally, manifest a series of ongoing infractions over an extended period of time, despite prior warning, constituting a pattern of conduct unbecoming a teaching staff member,” the documents, signed by Schilder, said.

“Respondent’s course of conduct during the relevant time period demonstrates his lack of temperament and unfitness to serve as a public school teacher, as well as his penchant for continuing to engage in such behavior, despite having been warned not to do so.”

The board of education has declined any further comment on the matter.