The Nicholas County High School principal who was suspended after an altercation with a student last week has been charged with fourth-degree assault, Montgomery County jail officials said.
-
- Joe Orazen
Joseph Orazen, 35, of Carlisle was released from the Montgomery County jail on a $7,500 cash bond Wednesday evening. He is scheduled to appear in court March 4.
Reached at his home Thursday morning, Orazen said, “It’s not what it looks like.” He said that at some point it will all come out. Orazen declined to comment further.
On Wednesday, Nicholas County schools released a statement saying Orazen had been suspended. Orazen had been on administrative leave since last week, shortly after the altercation with Nicholas County High School student Dusty Green, 15.
School officials declined to discuss any details about Orazen’s suspension. District officials released a statement saying, “Mr. Joe Orazen is suspended, and he has a right to request a hearing from the Commissioner of the Kentucky Department of Education.”
Green was suspended for 10 days after the incident, according to his mother, Michelle Green of Carlisle.
Green said Thursday that she expected a more serious charge. But now that Orazen has been criminally charged, she wants him prohibited from being around children.
“I’d like for him to be convicted,” she said.
Harrison County Attorney Charles Kuster, who has been appointed special prosecutor, said the evidence presented to him, including bruises and abrasions, and the fact that no weapon was involved resulted in the fourth-degree assault charge.
On Tuesday, WLEX-TV (Channel 18) released surveillance footage, saying it arrived in an unmarked package. The video shows a confrontation outdoors between a male student and a man, and WLEX reporters identified them as Orazen and Dusty Green. The footage shows the man wrapping his arms around the student, scooping him up and slamming him to the ground.
Nicholasville police seek man accused of ramming house with SUV
Danville Police Chief Jay Newell said Wednesday that no charges will be filed in the case of a YouTube video depicting several boys making sexually explicit comments about two middle-school girls.
“From our officers’ review of the YouTube video, there are no threats or any illegal activity that we can see,” Newell said. “It’s some kids that have said some rude things and put it on YouTube. But there’s no law against being rude.”
In the 3½ -minute video posted over the weekend, one young man raps about the girls’ genitals while two other boys make a variety of gestures, some of which are lewd.
Doug Trantham, the father of one of the girls mentioned in the video, expressed disappointment that the boys will not be charged.
“Exceptionally displeased,” Trantham said. “Appalled would be a word. Very appalled at the failure of the legal judicial system.”
Newell said: “If we charged every middle schooler that said something about another middle schooler or that called them a bad name, if you think the justice system is bogged down now … .”
In order for the boys to be charged with harassment, Newell said, “we would have to have a continuing course of conduct that served to harass, alarm or annoy the victim.”
“Obviously, if there is a continuing course of conduct that we can look at and say this is harassing, … then we would see if there is something we could do with that,” Newell said. “Or if they get on there and say ‘Next time’ or ‘We’re going to show them and teach them a lesson,’ that’s different. That is at least an implied threat.”
The Danville Independent school district is also looking into the matter.