Jury to CVESD: Pay Danielle Coziahr $1,012,000

A San Diego jury has a message for CVESD board members Pamela Smith, Cheryl Cox, and Bertha Lopez: your decision to discriminate against Danielle Coziahr in 2006 based on her gender caused $1,012,000 in costs and damages.

These three women apparently didn't lose any sleep over dismissing a teacher who was considered a leader by teachers with much more experience. I listened to testimony with the jury, and the evidence was clear: Coziahr was fired was one reason only, and that was that she was a woman who had a young child and another on the way.

The three women on the Chula Vista Elementary School District board demonstrated again and again that they aren't one bit softer than the hard-nosed duo of Patrick Judd and Larry Cunningham. Pam, Bertha and Cheryl seemed to go along with anything the boys wanted, even if it was illegal, or even criminal.

And the illegality didn't stop when former San Diego police chief David Bejarano took Cheryl Cox's place in January of this year.

The CVESD board needs a complete overhaul. And a reconstituted board would be wise to get rid of Parham & Rajcic law firm, and instead ask lawyers like Danielle Coziahr's attorneys Laura Joan Farris and C. Daniel Carroll for legal advice.

The Danielle Coziahr case has gone to the jury

Attorneys Laura Joan Farris (left) and Daniel Carroll yesterday finished the trial of Coziahr v. Chula Vista Elementary School District, and the case has gone to the jury.

The jury has one easy job and one hard job: first, to decide if the district violated the law, and second, to decide how much the district should pay Danielle Coziahr.

Education suffers when leaders like Danielle Coziahr are dismissed at the whim of inexperienced first-year principals,while the district board and administrators ignore what is going on in schools.

When problems surface, the CVESD board and its go-between, Tom Cruz, just tell the lawyers to spend whatever it takes to keep tax dollars out of the hands of teachers, and channel those dollars into the hands of lawyers.

Dan Carroll and Laura Farris take on CVESD

Dan Carroll of McCann and Carroll is taking on CVESD in San Diego Superior Court. He is representing Danielle Coziahr, a teacher who is suing for discrimination based on gender and pregnancy.

I wasn't able to go in to court today for opening arguments, since I'm busy writing a motion to compel CVESD's lawyers to produce documents and submit to depositions in their defamation case against me. Why did they bring the case when they know that they have to keep the truth covered up? The answer is that they believe that public entities will continue to protect them, as they protect public entities.

I wonder what the paper trail looks like in the Coziahr case. It was virtually non-existent in my case, except for the documents that were altered or hidden.

Laura Farris is co-counsel in the Coziahr case.

I'll be looking forward to witness testimony tomorrow and Thursday.