Former Employee Alleges His Brandywine Supervisor Had Him Arrested

A former Brandywine School District employee sent an email to the Brandywine School Board, Superintendent Dr. Mark Holodick, Delaware Secretary of Education Dr. Susan Bunting, myself, and others employed by the state last evening.  He accused a Brandywine Supervisor of having him arrested earlier this year.

09 August, 2018

Board of Education, Brandywine School District
1311 Brandywine Boulevard,
Wilmington, DE 19809

Dear Board Members,

I am writing this letter to let you know that your Transportation Supervisor, Mr. Lamont Gorman has once again used his position at Brandywine for his personal advantage in violation of the District and State of Code of Conduct for employees. The first time I discussed in detail with Kim Doherty in December and sent an email to Dr. Holodick about his unprofessional behavior. She told me that it was an issue between Mr. Gorman and me, even though It occurred while he was my immediate Supervisor.

The issue now is that Mr. Gorman used his position as my supervisor at Brandywine to have me arrested and criminally charged. On 08 May, 2018 Mr. Gorman had my special needs van pulled over by the Delaware State Police with my family inside to execute an arrest warrant issued by the City of Wilmington. I will never forget the look on my children’s faces, ages 5,7 and 9, when I told them I had to go with the policemen. I told them that this must be a mistake and I will see them later tonight to kiss them goodnight. After being transferred to the City of Wilmington police, I was arrested and placed in an already occupied City jail cell. The arresting officers, Martinez and Press asked me if I knew a Mr. Lamont D. Gorman. I said, yes and that he was my supervisor when I worked at the Brandywine School District. They said that Mr. Gorman has had me arrested for “Harassment” and making “False Claims”. Arrest Number 30001083. I told them this must all be a mistake. I never harassed or said anything false about Mr. Gorman. They said Mr. Gorman’s sworn statement was “Chris Joyce was relieved of his duties by me in December. After then he began to contact me by text, emails and phone calls until I blocked him. Then he began to harass my employees and make false statements about me to them and on the DOE and BSD website.” They told me I need to wait in the jail cell until a Judge is ready to issue bail. A few hours later I was seen by Judge Gerald Ross of JP11. He gave me a case number 1804007604. He issued bail at $500 and I called for a ride home. I was able to kiss my children goodnight.

The next day my first thought, was how could he take legal action without approval by the Board or Superintendent? How is he going to subpoena “His” employees which are State employees to prove his case? What emails does he plan to use against me? Any emails are District property, since I never had his personal email. Will he get permission to use said emails? My only phone calls to him were to Transportation in regard to retrieving my tools. The last time I called Transportation, Ms. DeVane answered and said Mr. Gorman wasn’t there. 10 minutes later, Kim Doherty called me and we discussed picking up my tools. Mr. Gorman flat-out lied in his sworn statement.

That same day, 09 May, I got a phone call from Mike McHugh, my family’s foster care agency supervisor at Children and Family First. He told me that the Department of Services for Children, Youth and their Families had called him. They said that I had been arrested and that they need to take my family’s foster care license away. We have been a foster care family with CFF since 2012. This put of hopes of adopting our 4th child in jeopardy. We have adopted 3 boys from the foster care system over 6 years and now our dream for a 4th was squashed. All 3 boys are in the Brandywine School District. 2 of our boys are biological brothers. One of them has Autism and is in the BSAP program. The other is intellectually disabled. We have a van that we use for private transportation of the kids (which was pulled over). Both have IEP’s and both use Mr. Gorman’s bus transportation for school transportation. I suppose Mr. Gorman will not attend IEP meetings if needed in the future? I wouldn’t want him there after this anyway. Our third child is a typical 5 year old at Mount Pleasant Elementary.

A few days later on 14 May, the State offered Mr. Gorman a mediator to try to work this out without going to court. Mr. Gorman demanded it goes to trial. I was scheduled for arraignment on 08 June. For the arraignment, my family hired an attorney, and pleads “not guilty”. Trial was scheduled for 30 July 2018 at 0830. In the weeks and then days preceding the trial, I kept asking our attorney if any discovery or evidence has been provided to the prosecutor by Mr. Gorman. The answer from my family’s attorney was that they have not received anything. Despite repeated attempts by the State Prosecutor to get in touch with Mr. Gorman for evidence, he never provided them with any proof of his claims that got me arrested and charged. At the day of trial, Mr. Gorman never showed. The State Prosecutor had no evidence and Judge John Welch dismissed the charges against me.

I started my service to the great State of Delaware and the United States, when I was sworn in to the United States Air Force, Delaware Air National Guard by General Hugh Broomall in January 2010. I proudly served for 6 years under command of Governor Jack Markell and President Obama. I served in Ready Reserve forces under John Carney and President Trump until I left the military in January 2018. My military career was spotless with gleaming performance reviews. I live every day by the Air Force motto “Integrity first, Service before self and excellence in all we do.” This false accusation by Mr. Gorman has cost me to also lose my Security Clearance due to arrest.

My family believes that this was clearly a stunt performed by Mr. Gorman to bully and intimidate my family and keep me from talking about what Kim Doherty and I discussed in December. Mr. Gorman is nothing but a Thug. I want to let you know what kind of dirt bag you have in charge of children’s bus transportation in our school district and the grief he has caused my Family.I trust that this time the Board will take the proper action unlike Ms. Doherty in December.

Sincerely,
Chris Joyce

I reached out to Brandywine Superintendent Dr. Mark Holodick about this situation. He gave me the following comment:

Per Mr. Joyce’s e-mail, it’s obvious that this post employment dispute has become incredibly personal. There are always two sides to a story and I imagine Mr. Gorman has a much different opinion about things. Needless to say, any person has the right to contact the police if they believe/feel they are being harassed by another individual and apparently Mr. Gorman felt that was the case.

As far as I can tell, the Delaware Department of Education and district websites do not give anyone the capability of leaving comments. I would have to assume this pertained to the Brandywine School District and Delaware Department of Education Facebook pages.

I reached out to Mr. Joyce for more information but he has not responded to my request.