A band director who found himself in hot water attempted to clear his name last week, taking his case to the airwaves in an effort to prove his innocence.
Jared Murray, the band director at Holmes High School in Covington, Ky., was suspended with pay last month after he allegedly sent inappropriate text messages to a female student, Cincinnati, Ohio’s, WCPO reported. But the teacher attempted to defend himself while appearing on a radio show last week.
“Most of [the messages] had to do with band-related activities, but I also allow myself to be a second father-figure to a lot of the students,” Murray told radio host Bill Cunningham. “It’s so I can tell them if they need any kind of help for anything, just let me know and I’ll always be there for them.”
But records of the messages from late August to early September suggest otherwise.
“You up?” Murray texted the student August 28 at 6:48 a.m.
“I knew I liked you for some reason,” he continued.
“Girl, you’re always looking nice,” Murray said at 7:18 a.m.
“You already know I’ll smack your a**,” the former band director said.
According to Murray, though, the texts were taken out of context and “had nothing to do with sexual solicitation,” he said on the radio show.
“What football coach or teacher out there today doesn’t say, ‘I’m gonna’ smack you on your ass’?” he said in an attempt to defend his actions.
But that’s not all Murray said.
Text records show the band director sent a message Aug. 28 at 12:14 p.m. — during school hours — saying, “If I was 20 years younger maybe.”
Then, a day later at 7:32 a.m., Murray asked the student, “So when you moving in?”
And after eight minutes, he reaffirmed his offer, writing, “We would have tons of fun.”
Murray’s attorney Chris Roach said telephone records were released Wednesday, though neither he nor other members of the defense were given copies.
But this is not an out-of-the-ordinary way the band director communicates with his pupils, Murray said.
“Throughout the years, this is how I’ve communicated to all of my students —through texts,” he said. “I’ve always told the kids, this kid in particular, if they’re having a rough time, they can move in with my wife and I to clear their head … Give them an outlet to get away from their problems.”
And for this student, in particular, he said, it’s his way of attempting to act like a father figure for the girl.
“I truly love that kid as if she was my own daughter,” Murray said. “She knows through our conversations how I care for her. … She was having a very, very bad day at her home and that’s what that was in reference too.”
The students’ mother, Shana Donski, though, said Murray’s actions were far from those of a caring father figure.
Murray went on to allege other teachers within the Covington School District and throughout Northern Kentucky who communicate in a similar manner.
“What’s being released is just one side of the story,” Murray said.
But in the meantime, the victim remains at home and, according to her daughter, was the target of harassment at school, forcing her to be home-schooled, Donski said.
Though the school district is choosing not to comment on the investigation, Murray said his contract was terminated immediately and he was given a chance to resign.
No charges have been formally charged, Roach said, and his lawyers do not anticipate he will be arrested.
“There’s a feeling that with the release of these texts that any possible criminal investigation is not continuing,” Roach said. “We know it’s not necessarily over, but we’re hoping no criminal charges will be brought. … He still has some ways to go before this is over.”
