Detroit schools hire teacher alleged of sexual misconduct in Southfield district

It's been a concerning week at the Detroit Public Schools Community District -- where two teachers are under investigation for inappropriate behavior with students.

Now the district is taking action against a recently hired teacher with a questionable background. 

This news comes as the district investigates two other teachers. One is said to have slept in the same hotel room as a 13-year-old student.  The other is said to have had sex with a student and the act was recorded on a cell phone.  

While there's no indication that happened at Henderson Academy, parents were still shocked to learn about the school's recent hire.  And now the Detroit Public School Community District is investigating the hiring of a teacher Derek Atlas at the west side school.

"Henderson, my kids go here and they love the teachers, they love being involved in things that's going on," said parent Eric Thomas. "So it's an easy target when people love coming to school and you get them to give their trust, and then you do something wrong to them like that."

Atlas, was brought on in late March. He is alleged to have had inappropriate contact with and sexually harassed two 11-year-old girls while working at Thompson International Academy in Southfield.

The girls' parents are suing him and the Southfield school district.

Attorney Scott Batey is a lawyer representing the alleged victims and spoke to FOX 2 about the allegations in previous report.

"He would touch her hair, he would physically intimidate her," Batey said. "Then he made the comment 'Just because I touch you doesn't mean I want you.'"

FOX 2: "What does that mean?"

"I don't know," Batey said.

"We've got daughters out here and young sons, so any behavior like that, it's got to go," said Terrence Austin, a parent.

DPSCD says it was unaware of the allegations when the teacher was hired, but removed him from the classroom upon learning of the controversy on social media. 

"I feel like we should've got a little more details," said a Henderson parent. "We needed to know, we don't know if our kids had access to this teacher."

"You would figure the school system for sure would have some type of background check implemented so you would be sure kids wouldn't have to worry about that.," Thomas said.

But DPSCD says it does, and the teacher passed both the background check and fingerprinting process.

The district says it's pushing for a statewide system to report allegations of sexual misconduct.

One parent says the district is to blame - not the school.

"Do I trust Henderson? Absolutely," said parent Pamela Johnson. "I trust the school and the fact that they acted expeditiously and did what they needed to do that's fine but everybody is innocent until proven guilty.":

"He could be innocent, he could be guilty, but once you've been in a situation like that, people want to know," Thomas said. "I got three and I don't want anyone messing with my babies like that."

The suit involving the teacher in question is set to go to trial in November.