CAC interested in Lewis incident report

MOBILE, Ala. (WALA) - The Mobile County School Board's work session highlighted the investigation of a teacher accused of exposing himself to a 12-year-old boy. School board members have demanded a thorough investigation into the allegations against Charles Lewis, Junior.

Pat Guyton is the director of the Child Advocacy Center in Mobile. He's an expert on protecting the rights of children.

"No one at the school has to prove anything, believe it or not believe it. What they have to do is report it to either law enforcement or DHR. They are mandatory reporters, the law has no gray area about that," Guyton said, regarding Alabama law and child abuse.

Superintendent Dr. Roy Nichols said he still isn't sure there was a need to report an incident with Lewis that happened September 2009. That complaint claimed Lewis exposed himself to the boy inside his Causey Middle School classroom.

"The circumstance was close to meeting the definition of child abuse. There is some question as to whether it does or not. If the investigation concludes it didn't meet the definition, what she did was appropriate. But I think it was close enough and should have been reported," Nichols said.

Nichols was referring to Causey Principal Mary Wood. He said Wood investigated the indecent exposure complaint against Lewis and found no wrongdoing.

Thursday, the Mobile County School Board got involved with the case by demanding answers from an ongoing internal investigation being done by the school system's security team.

"We will hear what the investigation says whether or not this was acted on, why it wasn't acted on, who dropped the ball and how we make sure this doesn't happen again," said William Meredith, president of the board.

Meredith said the facts and answers gathered from the investigation will be made public as soon as it is complete. Dr. Nichols said he expects to get preliminary information on the investigation soon. He told board members he agreed that a thorough investigation was needed and he assured them it would be done.