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Ex-school worker sentenced for cheerleader drinking
Friday, May 09, 2008
LEBANON — A former school volunteer and part-time worker at Springboro High School was sentenced to 30 days in jail and fined $500 on Friday, May 9, for allowing three cheerleaders to drink during a party last summer in her basement.
Judge Donald Oda II also ordered Mary Ellen Hause, 48, of Clearcreek Twp., to do litter pick-up while serving three years on probation on three counts of offenses involving underage persons, but said he'd allow Hause to talk about the problems of underage drinking instead.
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"We've moved into a time where parents look the other way," Oda said. "This can't be happening in our community anymore."
A jury found Hause guilty on all charges after a one-day trial in Warren County Court.
Hause was charged in October 2007 after the school's resource officer found a picture from the past summer of her smiling broadly between the cheerleaders drinking in her basement on facebook.com, a social networking web site.
On the witness stand Friday, two of the cheerleaders said Hause played drinking games with them. A boy at the party said Hause was upset and told them to leave.
Hause testified that she told them to leave and threw the drinks "in the trash can" after realizing — after the photo was taken — the kids were drinking in her basement.
The school resource officer, Sgt. Don Wilson,
testified that the girls weren't punished by the school because the district's code of conduct prevented the district from taking action regarding conduct off school property and over the summer.
Wilson said he was "kind of shocked" to find a part-time school employee in one of the pictures among more than 80 he found displayed on the social networking web site.
"She did work for the school and have exposure around kids a lot," Wilson testified.
After meeting with Superintendent David Baker, Wilson, a Springboro officer, said he began the criminal investigation with Clearcreek Twp. police, since Hause lived in the township.
Hause was charged with three counts of offenses involving underage persons, a first-degree misdemeanor. She faced up to six months in jail and a $1,000 fine on each count.
Oda also criticized Hause, who the kids all called "Mary Ellen," for allowing the underage partiers to drive away and failing to notify their parents.
"They needed a parent," Oda said.
Contact this reporter at (937) 225-2261 or lbudd@DaytonDailyNews.com.
