A disabled second grade teacher in New Jersey has been fired after he was found to have urinated in a classroom and made students carry urine-filled plastic bottles. Ron Tuitt, who has been a second grade teacher at Paterson Elementary School for over 14 years, was caught by a custodian urinating into a trash can in his classroom in 2010. It later came out that this was a semi-regular occurrence, and according to the state, Tuitt also had kids carry bottles filled with his urine to the bathroom to dump it.
Tuitt, who uses a motorized wheelchair due to severe leg swelling from lymphedema, initially stated that peeing in a trash can was a one-time incident, and no children were around. But according to investigators, one 12-year-old boy said that when he was 8, "the teacher had students close their eyes once a day for a minute. Then the boy and a friend would take a partly full bottle to the bathroom to dump it out."
A woman who worked at the school with Tuitt also claimed that he gave her cash to buy him a hand-held plastic urinal at a nearby pharmacy. She said that two or three times a week for about a year, she saw students carrying the urinal to and from the bathroom.
According to ABC, Tuitt denied some of the charges, but told the state that some incidents happened because he was ill and his principal had removed some accommodations. State Education Commissioner Christopher Cerf, who removed Tuitt's pension and fired him last week, said any such changes were not an excuse for his behavior.
