Ex-Superintendent's Suit Against Brick School Board Thrown Out

BRICK, NJ — A whistleblower lawsuit filed by former Brick Township Schools Superintendent Walter Uszenski against the Brick Township Board of Education has been dismissed by a Superior Court judge, nine years after legal proceedings began with his arrest.

Uszenski, who was named the Brick schools superintendent in 2012, was arrested in May 2015 on charges of official misconduct and theft by deception, accused of participating in a scheme to arrange for free child care for his grandson. He was suspended shortly thereafter.

Uszenski was indicted and the charges dismissed by Ocean County Superior Court Judge Patricia Roe twice, before a third indictment led to Uszenski entering the pretrial intervention program in 2019. The charges alleged his grandson was not eligible for services but fact-finding showed the boy did indeed have special needs.

The dismissal, by Monmouth County Superior Court Judge Owen McCarthy, was issued June 24, according to documents filed in connection with the court proceedings.

McCarthy explained his decision in an oral opinion on June 24, the Asbury Park Press reported.

He said the school board's decision to suspend and later not renew Uszenski's contract was not in retaliation for any of his whistleblowing activities, but was the required response after the district was notified by the state Board of Education that Uszenski's arrest disqualified him from school employment, the report said.

Uszenski was suspended, first with pay, and then without pay once the indictments were handed up on Sept. 29, 2015. He remained suspended without pay until his contract expired on June 30, 2018.

Uszenski and his daughter, who also was charged in the case, filed a $20 million lawsuit against the Brick Township Board of Education and school district, the prosecutor's office and several others including then-Mayor John G. Ducey, in September 2018.

Over time, court proceedings show, the defendant list was reduced to just the school board as claims against Ducey and others were dismissed.

Uszenski's lawsuit claimed the charges resulted from accusations made by Donna Stump, who Uszenski had demoted from director of special services after an audit discovered a $750,000 deficit caused by Stump's failure to submit invoices to the state Department of Education related to services for special needs students in the Brick schools. The state reimburses districts for a percentage of the money spent on special education services.

Uszenski's lawsuit also alleged Darlene Ciesla, the sister of former state senator Andrew Ciesla, had a "no-show" job with the district that Uszenski exposed, an Asbury Park Press report said. She had worked in the special education services part of the district but was not responsible for the invoices, according to the report. She has since retired.

Uszenski, 71, lives in Florida now, the Asbury Park Press report said. Charges against his daughter, who lives in Pennsylvania, were later dropped at the same time Uszenski agreed to the pretrial intervention program.

The arrest set off a fiery period for the Brick Township Schools, as school board meetings routinely turned into shouting matches and the school board election in the fall of 2015 turned into a free-for-all with criticisms of the school board by the public and candidates for not simply firing Uszenski.

The vitriol lingered for some time, as board members who were swept out of office returned regularly to criticize the new board in the first two years after that election. That has slowly dissipated as some of the members elected in that sweep left and the district moved on to other pressing issues, including the financial challenges of the S2 cuts, finding a long-term superintendent and the problems posed by the coronavirus pandemic.