Episode 25: Parent Kristen Fry on false accusations against her and school board, superintendent piling on

Transcript

Alan Gottlieb: 0:08

Hi everybody and welcome back to the Board Hawk podcast. Today we have as a guest, Kristen Fry, a DPS parent, who has been embroiled in a controversy against her own wishes with various DPS board members over the years recently, as well as others close to DPS. We also have. On the podcast, her attorney James Crowin from the Mountain States Legal Foundation we will let them tell the story, but essentially, and we've talked about this on the podcast before, Kristen has filed a lawsuit, a federal lawsuit against DPS and the these specific board members and people close to them for basically defaming her based on what happened at a board meeting a couple of years ago. So I'm gonna read a brief intro and then we'll go from there. Kristen Fry is a DPS parent who was caught in a maelstrom in 2023 when she was accused by Denver political operative Hashem Coates of assaulting her and using a racial slur against him at a DPS public comment SE session. Based on Coates's word fry was hit with criminal charges later dropped when surveillance video. She re acquired reveal that she never laid a hand on coats, but her name was dragged through the mud by board members and the superintendent. And as a result, she filed a federal lawsuit against board members, including the three incumbents running for reelection right now as Ochi Kaan, Scott Esserman and Michelle Quale Baum earlier this month, the Federal District court. Judge denied the defendant's motion to dismiss the suit. And so we have Kristen and her lawyer, James Kerwin on to talk about this incident, the suit, and what the entire situation said about the state of political discourse and disagreement. Locally and nationally today we'll start by having Kristen Teller's story and then James can talk about the suit and what it alleges and the state of the litigation. This all seems relevant to the upcoming elections. I said since the three incumbents named as defendants are all seeking reelection. Thank you both so much for coming on. Kristen and James.

Kristen Fry: 1:59

Thank you. Thank you.

Alan Gottlieb: 2:01

Great. Kristen. I think the best way to do this rather than. Do a long further introductions. Just have you tell your story from the day of this board meeting why you were there briefly, and then what happened.

Kristen Fry: 2:14

Yeah. Thank you. Thank you for the opportunity to speak about this. It's been it's been tough. So I was in the public comment board meeting on August 21st, 2023. It was the public comment right before the board, the school board was going to vote to accept or reject the termination recommendation for Kurt Dennis, principal McCullough. And there was a call put out in community asking if anybody would volunteer to read a statement from teachers who had something to say to the school board and they were worried about potential retaliation. I'd never spoken in public comment at that school board meeting before. But I support our teachers and so I somewhat reluctantly raised my hand and said, okay I'll do it. I was nervous to say my own. Piece, I could read somebody else's statement. So I, I showed up that evening prepared to read the teacher's statement as soon as the school board meeting began. And I believe it was a set of children who were trying to read their teacher statements. The board president there was some commotion, a little bit at the dais, and there was a little bit of a confusion and it was stated, seemed like a new rule to us that we weren't allowed to read anybody else's statements. That only the people who had signed up for school board or public comment could. Could speak and we were speaking, but we weren't allowed to say anybody else's comments, which is odd because I think I've heard people read poems and from books and quoted other people before. So that seemed like a made up rule. So I scrambled a little bit rephrased my statement. But it definitely was off-putting. And we felt like they were trying to quiet us in the audience who were speaking up on behalf of Kurt and teachers. So that's how it started. And I did observe that there were two individuals seated directly next to the podium. Who in prior town halls and other events I had attended with the school board had. Called some of us parents and who are part of the McCall of Strong Facebook group racists and white supremacists and part of the K, KK et cetera. And so it was really intimidating about to go into that space. I knew that they had an opinion different from mine on whether or not Credent should be terminated.

Alan Gottlieb: 4:27

And Kristen, could you just name those two individuals? There's no reason not to.

Kristen Fry: 4:31

Yeah. Okay. Sorry. One was Mr. Hashem Coates and the other at the time was named Meen Luckett Holmes. She is been remarried and her name is now Meen Schaffner. I'm sorry if I'm mispronouncing it. I've never actually heard of Schaffner. And so that's how it began. And then, I was later in the list to speak, so I heard lots of people speaking. And I heard repeated interruptions by these two individuals Mr. Coates and Ms. Schaffner as people were speaking who had different opinions than them. And

Alan Gottlieb: 5:02

it was what kind of interruptions? I'm sorry to interrupt you, but I'm just curious. Like they

Kristen Fry: 5:06

were talking, they were laughing. They were, gesturing, it just, it was disruptive enough that, that it caught my attention. I, I think it's very different environment than a town hall where someone's speaking in a microphone and there's reactions in the crowd, et cetera. But when someone's speaking at a, in a public common, a school board meeting to your elected officials, it's a sacred space. And so it, it definitely stood out to me. I'd been to other board meetings and heard public comment and I don't recall it being that disruptive. And others noticed it as well. I can speak to that later. But anyway, so it was disruptive enough that I actually left the room and I went and spoke. I tried to speak to an admin running, helping run the meeting and say, Hey, could you have the president of the school board reiterate that we should be. Civil and show some decorum. We have children in the room, et cetera. And I spoke with the, I believe it was the CIO of DPS an admin working, I presume for the superintendent and a security guard. And they all declined to take any action. Not even just repeat that. We all should be, acting like adults and allowing people to speak. So I let it go. Fine. All right. I think it was, I don't know, half hour later or something. It was my turn to speak. I got up I was next in line to speak. There was a gentleman speaking in front of me at the podium and a Garrett again, I heard. Disruptions noise coming from these two individuals. So at that point I felt like it, I was, it felt personal at that point.'cause I was about to go into that space and I was already very nervous and I leaned toward Mr. Coates was closest to me. So I leaned toward him and I said, please be respectful of the speakers. Then I stood back in line. At no point did I touch him, I didn't, there was no contact whatsoever. And that is what I said, please be respectful of the speakers. He turned around and said, did you just call me an N and you can fill in the blanks. It's the word I don't use. But he used it and I was shocked. And I leaned again toward him, no contact, and said no. I said, please be re respectful of the speakers. I just repeated what I said and I. I I was in shock. I was an absolute shock. I think I looked around wait, there's video on this, right? Somebody heard that, somebody saw that am I in the twilight zone? Which just happened. And then I stepped up to this, the podium and I had to compose myself and get it together and say my. My prepared statement and at three times he interrupted me. He, and she interrupted me while I was speaking at the podium.

Alan Gottlieb: 7:42

And what were they saying when they interrupted you? What did they say?

Kristen Fry: 7:44

I think I heard like a no or right, or something that was negating what I was saying. And I said at one point I said look at the data. That was when I was discussing the IFF data and how IFF data for kids of all color and all backgrounds was better than other DPS schools. At one interruption I said, please be respectful of the speakers, sir. Actually got more polite. I forget what the other, I think I said, excuse me. Those were the three things I said. Excuse me. And the other two. Yeah, I, it was shocking to me. I've certainly never said that word to anyone, and I've never been accused of it. So I, but again, Mr. Coats in particular has called those of us who are supporting Kurt Dennis, racist and white supremacists and part of the KK KKK and all of that before. So I wasn't, surprised, but I hadn't received it personally, so

Alexis Menocal Harrigan: 8:37

I was shocked. Okay. I'm so sorry, Kristen, that you had to experience that. So once you finished your public comment, what happened after that? So I felt

Kristen Fry: 8:52

like I was in the Twilight Zone, Alexis, because if that, if I had said that or if anybody had said that. I would've expected there to be some sort of reaction by the board.

Alexis Menocal Harrigan: 9:02

The room would've erupted if somebody heard you say those words. Absolutely. That's my perspective. As it should.

Kristen Fry: 9:08

As it should, right? I don't condone that language. I, that's horrible as it should. So it was like, wait, did I imagine that? This is so bizarre. But there was no reaction whatsoever from any of the school board members, the security that was there at present the superintendent, even Mr. Coates or Ms. Schaffner, after that incident. In fact, after the public comment session was over, I walked outside and I was talking to two individuals in the parking lot by my car and outta the corner of my eye, I saw both of them Mr. Coates, Ms. Shoffner, walking outta the building, and Mr. Coates actually walked up to us. I, I started to panic. Is he gonna say something else? Is he, I don't know what he's gonna do. So I got ready to leave, but he actually walked up to the woman I was speaking to, gave her a big hug, nice to see you. Didn't pay me any mind at all. And again, it was just so bizarre. I'm like, wait, if this just happened, how could you be, three feet from me and be totally blase, nonchalant. It was the strangest thing I've ever experienced. Yeah, so cut to I think it was the next day or the day after he, Mr. Coates posted on Facebook that he was trying to find my name and he wanted to know if anyone knew the name of the person, the white woman, white lady who. Touched him without his consent, something to that effect, and called him the N word. And I thought, oh my gosh, now he's doxing. Now he's going after me online. Now it's my reputation, even broader than just this room and the live stream that was happening at the time. And so I was very concerned. I immediately changed my Facebook profile. I took my picture of my kids off of my cover page. I was worried about them. Then he said he had found me. He said my name there on Facebook. But again, I just thought it was him online. Okay, fine. And then all of a sudden I get contacted by the Denver Police Department and they say that they want to talk to me. They actually contacted me through Facebook. I was under contact. Wait, hold on. The police department reached out to you via Facebook. I actually thought I was being, spam. Yeah. I thought it was spam. Maybe it was a buddy of his or something. I was, I almost didn't take it seriously and I thought, wait, hold on. Maybe this is real. I need to contact him. I asked if I could come down and talk to them. I got I've never been in trouble with the law before. I. I, I guess I probably shouldn't have done that, but I was like, oh I'm sure we can clear this up. I'll explain what happened. I'll show, we'll show the video. This won't go anywhere. Because it never happened. It's crazy.

Alexis Menocal Harrigan: 11:37

But in, and when you say show, I'll show the video you had already because the videos are posted the next day, right? Or later that day. So you had seen the video? No, but this was a,

Alan Gottlieb: 11:45

yeah, the video. Now the video that, if I'm not mistaken, the video that actually exonerates. Kristen is something that was from a surveillance camera in the ceiling. If you look at the video, it looks and it was something she had to go out and get. It wasn't from the board meeting.

Kristen Fry: 11:58

That is correct. I actually submitted a co request within days and prior to being charged with a crime to DPS to get that video and to get any communication that was sent to the board.

Alexis Menocal Harrigan: 12:10

And hold on. We'll come back to that. Yeah. But let's, so you went to down to the police department, to the precinct and what happened?

Kristen Fry: 12:15

I was, actually before I could even get there, I was told that I was being charged that there was a warrant being drafted by for my arrest. Wow. And I don't know about you guys, but I do not have a criminal defense attorney on my, in my Rolodex. So I, reached out to some people and found a contact and hired a lawyer immediately. Who then contacted the police. And I was charged initially with a citation, a municipal citation of disturbing the peace and was told by my attorney, it's okay, go down the next day and go pick it up. Which I did. And then I'm always bad enough, right? I've got a, I've got a defense attorney. What, what is happening? How is this possible? This is completely made up. I went in for my first arraignment, words, you never think you're gonna say. And at my arraignment, I was told that I had been up charged. That the city attorney was giving my case to the district attorney. Wow. And I was being charged with a misdemeanor of harassment strike shove meaning of physical harassment. And they had added a ethnic intimidation, sentencing enhancer because it was a hate crime. Wow. Yeah. Yeah. And this whole time I'm trying to get the Cora request, I'm trying to get the video. DPS is refusing to provide me the video saying now it's part of a criminal proceeding. I actually first. Submitted my court request anonymously but then eventually told them who I was and that I was a party to that criminal proceeding, and they still refused to give it to me. It cost thousands of dollars for me to get my defense attorney to subpoena the video. They eventually gave it in December, so this happened in August. They eventually produced it in December. Immediately upon viewing the video, everybody realized that there was nothing here. It is very unfortunate. I will acknowledge the video does not have audio, and that is

Alexis Menocal Harrigan: 14:10

so frustrating. But I, so I've seen the video the surveillance camera video and that's why I said, what I had said earlier is if you used that derogatory hate word, there were people around that would have i've been to so many board meetings. Yes. It's not it's like the MAGA right is in the room. There's, I've been to so many board meetings. It would have erupted if that word was used. I completely agree. And somebody heard it as it should. As it should. Like I would agree. I would support that.

Kristen Fry: 14:41

It would, yeah.

Alan Gottlieb: 14:42

We'll post a link to that video'cause I have a copy of it. And so I'll, we'll get it somehow linked on the. Post with the podcast so people can look at it. It's very short. 20, 30 seconds and it just super clearly shows that Kristen never touches hasheem.

Alexis Menocal Harrigan: 14:56

And so the video clearly discredits. I would, okay. My assumption is the video shows that it discredits the claim that there was a physical altercation of physical assault. So what do you, what happens like with the attorneys and the criminal charges, what happens then?

Kristen Fry: 15:14

So this whole time, Mr. Coates, and it's in the, it's in my criminal case file is continuing to claim that the violence between us has been increasing and that he's, afraid and all these things. So he's pushing for. There to be more charges and higher level charges. Apparently when he filed a police report he wanted me to be charged with assault. And he to this day, still claims that I assaulted him. And so I think under that pressure, the da, was looking to pin something else on me. I don't know how else to say that. That's how it felt at the time. So even though the harassment strike shoved, the physical harassment charge was going to be dropped it still remained there for about a month. But in the meantime. The very new da charged me with harassment obscene language, which okay, face value, obscene language. I agree. That's an obscene term like that. I agree with that On face value, however, the law actually very clearly states that harassment, obscene language can only be used. Sexual language. So if I had, harassed this individual in a sexual nature, which I can assure you I never did, perhaps that would've been appropriate, but it was unconstitutional for the DA to charge me with that crime. And it took about a month for us to then go back to court again, and the judge did not accept that charge. And so both of those charges were dropped, but the judge said to the da, would you like time to consider additional charges? And he said, yes. He would like to consult superiors and consider additional charges.

Alexis Menocal Harrigan: 16:56

And was it the DA himself was it John Walsh or was it somebody who like one of his, one of his attorneys. Correct. It was at the time of very junior da. Okay. Got it. Just

Alan Gottlieb: 17:06

okay. And I wanna back up a little and this is all part of the narrative, but, so this all happened, after the video came out in December, but in the meantime, in August I want you to talk about what different board members said at, there was a work session in August 2023, at which I know. Sochi Gaan, Scott Esserman and Michelle Kba, at least maybe others. And then the superintendent said stuff, and so just completely accepted the at face value that what Emko said was completely true and said some pretty. Bad things about you Do, do you wanna talk about that a little bit? Sure. What you heard and then what, how that made you feel?

Kristen Fry: 17:45

Sure. I think it's important to say that we learned in discovery that Ms. Shoffner actually sent an email to the board as well. So Mr. K and Shoffner both. Okay. Wrote emails into the board within days of the, of this. Not happening. That accused me of these things, these false allegations. And both of those were taken as true by the board. I don't know if they knew they were true. And they chose to go forward with these false accusations anyway, knew that they weren't

Alan Gottlieb: 18:08

true, you mean,

Kristen Fry: 18:09

or? Yeah. Yeah. They certainly, they know they're true. They know they're, they know that these allegations are untrue now. I think it will be interesting to learn. At what point did they learn that they were untrue? The Friday after the Monday public comment meeting, so this was August 24th or fifth. In 2023, there was that working session and for the first 10 minutes of the board meeting every single one of the sitting seven board meeting board members, so that's Carrie Olson, gaan, Esserman, QBA Charmaine Lindsey, Scott Baldman, and Mr. An Anderson and the superintendent all. Excoriated me talking about how awful racism is, which I agree, and how awful, this incident was, and that community members should be able to show up and be treated with respect, which I agree. It's the, I the irony of that. The irony. Wow. Exactly. I completely agree with that. So it was. Devastating to hear them talking about me. And I had people texting me and sending me messages on Facebook like, oh my gosh, are they talking about you? And they were talking about my family. The superintendent, Dr. Marrero actually said something to the effect of, no matter what we do in DPS, it, kids go home to families like this. And they're talking about my family.

Alan Gottlieb: 19:26

That's exactly what he said. I just listened to it again the other

Alexis Menocal Harrigan: 19:28

day. E essentially es insinuating that. The district can do everything right to educate children, but if children are going to homes that, with racist or people who are bigots, that it still would be something that, that is problematic for children.

Kristen Fry: 19:44

And like you said, El Alexis, the irony. I agree. I agree with that. It's just you've got the wrong girl, you've got the wrong family. It's, that's what was so infuriating and yeah. Through this whole experience, I've learned how easy it is to, just walk into the police department and file false accusations and our system allows for it. And yes, my case was eventually dismissed, but the nightmare that I went through and my family and the tens of thousands of dollars, the emotional toll, it just. It's not okay that our system can be used against anybody who looks like me or doesn't look like me, right? It shouldn't happen to anybody. So that's why I

Alexis Menocal Harrigan: 20:25

decided to stand up. Th thank, thanks for sharing. Kristen. I just excuse my ignorance on this, but, so you went through this eventually, it led to nowhere. The charges were dismissed, but you still spent tens of thousands of dollars to defend yourself. What happens then, if it turns out not to be true, do you. Do they have to pay you back? Like how does that work?

Alan Gottlieb: 20:46

You sue? Apparently. I think that's what you do. So can you talk a little bit about that? What, how you decided to sue and then how you found James. And then I'd love to hear James's perspective on this, like from a legal perspective.

Kristen Fry: 20:58

Sure. In a nutshell it was very, it was a very difficult decision. There was a huge impact to my, to me and my family. During the criminal proceeding, which was about five months. And to consider going through something like that again was, did I wanna put myself through that? Did I wanna put my family through that? Were we going to have to come up with a hundred thousand dollars to, to do that? There were so many impacts to consider. I will say there was an emotional toll on my husband. There was my, IM, my marriage was impacted. Because my husband was leaning toward, I think that's gonna be too much. I think it's gonna be too much for Kristen's mental health, for my family, et cetera. And I eventually just said, you know what I, this happened to me for a reason. This happened to me for a reason. And I am always the squeaky wheel of standing up for somebody who can't or won't or doesn't have the resources to. To fight back. And I feel like it happened to me for a reason in this season of my life where I can, and I'm standing up to political bullies. This is not about partisan politics or anything like that. It's just this should not be allowed for anybody to do to quiet the voices of our citizens who are just speak, speaking up to elected officials. So I started talking to various attorneys. And I had met Will TrackMan because he was actually present in the school board meeting that day and I spoke with him afterward and said, I appreciate the comments that you made and et cetera. So I just made a quick connection there. I remembered he was with a law firm. I think that's eventually how I reached out to Mountain States Legal Foundation. And I am eternally grateful that they took my case. I literally cried the day that they let me know they would pick it up, and I have been grateful ever since.

Alan Gottlieb: 22:51

Just to be clear, can you say who Will is, and then I want to hear from James. You said Will Truckman, but we, I just don't know if our listeners know who he is. So

James Kerwin: 22:59

Jim, do you wanna. Sure. He's a, he's the General Counsel here at Mountain State's Legal Foundation. Okay. And if you want me to jump in, I can.

Alexis Menocal Harrigan: 23:07

Yeah please do. Please share what is Mountain State's Legal Foundation?

James Kerwin: 23:09

Mountain State Legal found. And who are

Alexis Menocal Harrigan: 23:11

you? Jim?

James Kerwin: 23:11

I'm James Kerwin. Thanks for asking. I am an attorney here at the Mountain State's Legal Foundation. We've been, a Colorado based pub nonprofit litigation impact litigation firm for going on 40 years now, or something along those lines. We're a liberty oriented organization and we provide free legal representation in civil rights cases. In particular I focus on first amendment cases. That's essentially what I do 99% of my time. And I really just wanna piggyback off of some stuff that Kristen just said. And just frame this up to why. So we take impact litigation cases, we are. Kristen's personal experience was terrible. But the, we are interested in taking cases that have a broader impact than just an individual case, and this is definitely one of them. And it's important to note that when, as Kristen put it, political bullies. Retaliate for speech with which they disagree. They are targeting the person they're retaliating against for sure. That's they're gonna, they're silencing Kristen, but they're really looking beyond her. They're looking at other people, like most importantly, you set an example. To try to stop other people from joining the cause that Kristen represented, which, and it, and that goes both forwards and backwards in time from what we were just talking about there, what happened to Kristen stands as a an example to others, right? Which is, look, if you go in and you oppose what was happening at that board meeting, which was terminating Kurt Dennis, and we can go into how that whole thing is wrapped up in what, Kurt Dennis has brought his own lawsuit again about retaliation for protected speech.

Alan Gottlieb: 24:56

We've had him and his attorney on the podcast too.

James Kerwin: 24:59

Yeah. And what you get is a pretty coherent picture of a group of people who, might've started out with, honorable motives or whatever, but they implemented some policies in school that. Co were very controversial. And when the controversy exploded, their instinct was to shut it down, right? It wasn't to engage in a debate. It was, we're gonna clinging on to our power no matter what we need to do. And it wasn't just Kristen who was targeted, it was other people. And also, again, it's important that when this happens to Kristen and to others, it's not just about them, it's also about. And then the next person who's gonna get up at the next school board meeting is gonna be thinking twice. He goes, Hey, I can, she got, she went through a criminal prosecution for a crime that didn't happen at all. And that's what's going on in these cases. And so I would say, I think they picked the wrong victim here with Kristen as she pointed out. She has to relive all of this by bringing this lawsuit. And we are grateful to her that she's willing to do that because it does have a bigger impact than just her case or her story.

Alexis Menocal Harrigan: 26:08

Thank you so much, James. And Kristen. Go ahead Alan.

Alan Gottlieb: 26:12

I was just gonna ask James, in cases that you've been involved with that might have some similarity to this in some way. Have you ever had one where the evidence, and again we don't, I'm just gonna say this because there is no audio, none, nobody other than probably Kristen and Hasheem can know with a hundred percent certainly what was said. But the video evidence is incredibly clear. And I'm just curious if you've seen. A case where somebody's assertions are so provably false in, so it just seems and that, and they'll rush to judgment by public and elected and public officials to castigate, excoriate, whatever word you want to use, drag through the mud somebody Have you. Is this an unusually clear and egregious case, or is it, have you seen a lot of things like this?

James Kerwin: 27:01

We. The allegations in the complaint are pretty clear on this. We alleged that the defendants knew that the allegations were false. Or, in the alternative they took no steps whatsoever before as you put a castigating Kristen, for a full 10 minutes at the next board meeting for something that had happen before incredulously, just repeating those allegations, if that's what happened. We're seeking punitive damages that, so I, I think that. Answers your question as to whether we've there has been egregious conduct in this case. So yeah, I think the allegations in the complaint speak for themselves on that. I as com you, I think you asked me to compare this to other matters. Yeah. Just it just seems so

Alan Gottlieb: 27:41

clear to me. It's so obvious that stuff was, some of this stuff at least was made up and I, again, I'm just being super careful'cause nobody, there's no audio. So I'm just being super careful. I'm not saying I don't believe Kristen, I do but. Know, we don't have the audio, but it the, I'm just curious if there's, if yeah. You have such a slam dunk as this of something being clearly just not true.

James Kerwin: 28:01

So ultimately a jury's gonna make a decision about what the facts of the case are. We have the allegations in the complaint, which are very strong and we think supportable by the evidence. And, it sounds if you would presumably agree at least based on the evidence that you've seen so far dif. These things are always unique to the situation, right? This is when people retaliate against speech that they're, that they disagree with. There's no sort of set formula for how they do it. And I think this is a great example of that. It's again, there's not like a crystal clear plan ahead of time that what we're gonna do is charge Kristen Fry with a hate crime offense that she didn't commit. Sort of in the moment. The opportunity presented itself to Mr. Coates is what we allege, and he went with it and then the school board members backed him up. That sort of I don't think that, at the time. Certainly on the day that it happened, Mr. Coates hadn't seen the video surveillance video evidence, so I don't know what was exactly in his head. Kristen, of course, always knew from the very beginning that she neither called him, a racial slur. She did not touch him and. That's why she was so shocked by all of this and so experienced such a nightmare. I think Kafkaesque is not

Alan Gottlieb: 29:19

Absolutely, it is totally Kafka. Yeah. Yeah. One more question and then I want to let Alexis ask some questions'cause I've been asking too many, but I'm just curious. I don't get, I'm curious about the punitive damages in all of this. I'm just interested in the money. Aspect of it. My impression is that none of the people that are named in the suit are deep pockets individuals. And so is the district post potentially on the hook for any of this or is really what this is about? Exoneration and not financial remuneration?

James Kerwin: 29:49

The main point is to, first of all. Justice for Kristen. As a, as an individual. The second is to try to undo what I talked about at the beginning, which is the deterrent effect on other people's abilities. Willingness to speak up. Again, when retaliation for disfavored speech happens, the idea is to cause other people to self-censor, right? To say, I might be next, so I'm not gonna do anything about it. How do you get, how do you undo? That is really a main focus for us, in addition to helping Kristen give justice for herself. You get that through a federal judgment saying that this happened, right? This was wrong. And you get it through. There's lots of ways you do it. You can get an injunction against the school district. Unfortunately because lawsuits take a really long time to play out that somewhat blunts the ability of those sorts of things to have an effect going forward. Monetary damages do tend to deter people from, again first of all, it deters them from doing the same kind of thing again, but it also. If somebody is sitting there and saw what happened to Kristen and is thinking, I'm, I wanted to go and speak up at the next board meeting or maybe be involved politically into what's going on here, but I'm not gonna do it because of what happened to Kristen. It can help them regain their confidence. That's worth the idea. So I hope that answered your question.

Alan Gottlieb: 31:06

Yeah, thanks. Yeah. This has been great. I think you all have laid this out really clearly. And I want to thank you for coming on. I know Alexis had a couple of things she wanted to say. So I'll turn it over to her.

Alexis Menocal Harrigan: 31:17

Yeah. I first of all, Kristen, just thank you so much for your bravery and taking this on. I know what what it means to stand up to this that, that specific board and the superintendent and those of you who listen to the podcast who are close friends of mine, know the story I'm about to tell, but I've never shared this story publicly. And I think listening to you, listening to James has really inspired me to speak out myself and the retaliation I've experienced. So this is something most people have not heard before. Who, unless they're close friends of mine. As many people know, I organized a letter of Latino community leaders. A lot of state legislators, city council members, civic leaders, nonprofit leaders. Urging the school board to postpone the contract extension of superintendent Alex Morero. And in the letter we actually said there are some good things he has done. We specifically talked about the support he has had a immigrant students, Latina, Latin Latinx students and setting up setting up a committee like good things. Never once did we, attack him as a person or his superintendency or his competency. I then went and actually spoke at public comment. During this time I also had organized a petition from others who wanted to, who, weren't part of the Latino community, but also wanted to sign on to a petition, basically urging the school board to pause, do an evaluation before extending prematurely, extending the contract and trying to seek understanding of why that was the case. I ended up speaking at public comment and on a different topic actually. It was about facilities use and I chose to at the end, the last 10 minutes, 10 seconds or 30 seconds or so of my public comment, ended up pivoting my speech to actually reference the vast number of community members who have. Who were asking the super or asking the board to delay the superintendent's contract extension. I was immediately interrupted by the board president Kerry Olson. And I sat down, I finished my comments. I sat down in the meeting and once the public comment had ended and the board members went up and spoke about their comments it was about a seven minute tirade from super or board member esserman on, pushing back essentially on the organizing effort that I did and pushing back on and basically saying there are some things that are community input. This is not one of them referring to the superintendent's contract. Not surprising. I've witnessed what you had gone through. I've witnessed what other people have gone through. Like you need to have thick skin speaking at public comment at school board, at Denver, public school board meeting. I have thick skin. What I was not prepared for. Was in the two or three days after I was at a work comp or I was at a work event in Washington, DC And I got a call from our head of HR and the head of hr basically said our CEO and I'm not gonna list where I work. People really wanna look it up. They can go to my LinkedIn page. But my, my, my day job that pays the bills is not podcasting. I'll just tell you guys right now. This is my side gig. This is what I'm moonlight as richly

Alan Gottlieb: 34:21

rewarded as she is for it. Yes.

Alexis Menocal Harrigan: 34:24

Alan pays me the big bucks to chat with him and all of you. No. So my day job the head of HR for the nonprofit that I work for is a large nonprofit based in the. DC area. So I was in DC for an event and I remember distinctly I was sitting in my hotel room and I got a call from my head of hr and she basically said that our CEO had gotten a call. From the executive director or president or CEO of Alas, which is the American, or the association of Latino administrators and superintendents. And that and in the subsequent months and maybe even year I think we had been trying to figure out a partnership with them. We're a national nonprofit. They're a national nonprofit. And we'd been trying to work with them. I wasn't really engaged in those conversations. But it was something we're trying to do partnerships with. And essentially the head of that organization told the CEO of my organization, we are going to stop seeking any partnership with you effective immediately. And my CEO rightfully was caught off guard. He's I'm so sorry. What happened? Did we do something? And he said a member of your staff has called for the resignation or firing of one of the key members of our organization. The board chair of Alas is Alex Madero or was, I don't know if he still is, so I cannot prove that the superintendent of Denver public schools called. His employee, the executive director of Atlas. But I can say that that person called my CEO and then my CEO of course said I, who was it? And he is like Alexis. So they used my name and of course my CEO as I would've too. It was like, we take this very seriously. We will look into this. We will investigate. If there's anything you can send us, please send it over. And, the head of our HR department, spent her day that day looking up everything I've ever said publicly, looking up public comment, looking up everything I've ever put in writing. And as I was not surprised, I've never once called for the superintendent's firing or resignation. Publicly, privately. I have conversations with my husband and and to your point, Kristen, like I real, I think what set me over the top was when you made the comment about how your husband has reacted to it. Like my husband and I have had many a conversations and tense discussions about. Should I lean into this or not? Because this is I'm our primary breadwinner in, in my family. And I'm so appreciative that my organization and my organizational leaders believed me and believed my side of the story. And, I can't speak for them but I would imagine they think myos a piece of work. And I've spoken with reporters about this who were doing stories like on background hey, we're looking into a retaliation. I know other people who have experienced retaliation, who si similar situation where the superintendent or someone close to him has called their employer after they've spoken out either on public comment or somewhere else. And so I just, I say this. Not to distract from your story, Kristen.'cause I really appreciate it. But because your bravery has really allowed me to say something that I've been wanting to say publicly for a long time. And and again I haven't pursued legal action because it's a lot of hearsay. You can't prove that he spoke to the executive director of the other organization. But I do believe that he tried to get me fired for my job and and I'm still working there and I love it. And yeah, so I. Exclusive. Here you go.

Kristen Fry: 37:45

Alexis, I'm so sorry that happened to you. I, I'm getting emotional just listening to you because it brings it all back being accused of something you haven't done, especially when it hits at the core of who you are and just something so egregious that you could never imagine doing. And then it's impacting your livelihood. I'm just, I'm so sorry that you went through that.

Alexis Menocal Harrigan: 38:04

Yeah. And it's just really upsetting that, that. This board, the superintendent. It's exactly what you were saying, James. It's political bullying. It is. That I think that's a perfect way to describe it. And I've just seen it over and over again. And that's partly why I am, I'm so glad that Alan and I have this platform on the podcast to just name the thing, get into the details, call it out, because some of this is pretty nuanced and detailed And, so thanks for Li Thanks everybody who's listening. Thanks to you guys for jumping on the podcast and

James Kerwin: 38:33

yeah. Thank you for giving us an opportunity. It's great to sh for Kristen's story to get out there as broadly as we can. It's important. Yep.

Alan Gottlieb: 38:43

All right. Thanks everybody, and we'll be back with another episode soon.