Saturday, July 14, 2007

This man did something about crime in schools

Edward Stancik, school investigator, 47


Wednesday March 13 2002
Schools Investigator Stancik Is Dead at 47
By ALISON GENDAR and JOE WILLIAMS

Special schools investigator Edward Stancik, who for more than a decade worked to rid city schools of child molesters and crooks, died yesterday at NYU Medical Center.

Stancik, 47, had been hospitalized for at least several weeks and had a history of heart problems. His office listed the cause of death as heart failure.

During Stancik's tenure, more than 1,000 school employees were fired or disciplined as a result of his investigations. Many were later convicted of crimes.

"He had a very difficult job, and he did it well," said former Mayor David Dinkins, who created the post by executive order in 1990 and hired Stancik.

Stancik, then deputy chief of the rackets bureau for Manhattan District Attorney Robert Morgenthau, was the only person who had held the job.

In his first six weeks in office, Stancik arrested five teachers and school workers on charges of sexually abusing students.

He continued to bulldoze his way through the school system, attracting both headlines and resentment.

In one of his most significant achievements, Stancik documented rampant patronage in local school districts and corruption in school board elections, helping to spur a change in state law in 1996 that stripped the city's community school boards of most of their power.

"We make people walk in the light. We shine a light in dark places," Stancik told the Daily News on Dec. 2, 2000, his 46th birthday..

http://slick.org/pipermail/deathwatch/2002-March/000073.html

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