Two years later, no closure on child abuse case

BURNSIDE, Ariz., March 13, 2008

One thing is for sure: Sometime during Jan. 6, 2006, someone hit 6-year-old Rose Nez of Houck, Ariz., hard and repeatedly on the buttocks with a long, thin object.

That's what the doctor who examined her concluded, and, looking at the pictures of the long, raised welts on the child's backside, you don't have to be a physician to come to the same conclusion.

The question is, who?

Her mother, Regina Nez, says she didn't do it, and a Navajo Nation social services caseworker found no reason to remove Rose from her home.

Rose's kindergarten teacher at Sanders Elementary, Christi Frank, told school district investigators she didn't do it, and after their inquiry, they agreed.

Rose at first blamed a classmate, then changed her story and said Frank did it.

According to the doctor's report, the injuries were more consistent with an adult standing over the child to hit her, and they certainly seem too severe to have been inflicted by another 6-year-old.

At the tribe's Criminal Investigation Administration in Window Rock, the case is still open. And a judge in Apache County Superior Court in St. Johns, Ariz., is deciding whether to award Nez and her husband, William T. Nez, Jr., $5 million in civil damages, as they have asked.

Oral arguments in the civil suit were heard Jan. 17, and the couple is still waiting for a verdict.

"I feel like everything's at a standstill," said Regina Nez.

Added William, "It's not about the money. We want justice."

Regina put it a bit more emphatically: "Someone put their filthy hands on my baby. I want to know who it is, and I want them to pay."

Sanders school Superintendent Doug McIntyre didn't return a phone call to his office by press time.

According to Regina Nez, she picked up her daughter from school Jan. 6, 2006, and noticed her shifting uneasily in the car.

"My butt hurts," Rose told her mother.

Thinking it was "one of those rashes kids get when they don't wipe themselves good after going to the toilet," Regina told her daughter to hang tight until they got home, and she would put some Vaseline on it.

But when she pulled Rose's panties down, she got a shock.

"There were three nasty, red, deep marks on her butt and straight lines and red dots on her legs," she recalled.

"What happened?" she asked Rose.

The child explained that she and two classmates had been held back from recess for playing with clothes hangers, and the other children had whipped her with the hangers.

But upon further questioning, Rose reportedly blurted out, "Ms. Frank spanked me with a clothes hanger!"

Regina waited for her husband to get home from work, then took Rose to Rehoboth McKinley Christian Hospital in Gallup to be examined by a doctor.

The doctor declared the wounds to be "non-accidental trauma" and called the Navajo Nation Police. By this time it was 1:30 a.m. on Jan. 7.

Regina said the police officer took her report and promised to turn the case over to Criminal Investigations, but after she didn't hear anything for a year, she called CI herself and discovered they had no record of the case. At that point, she filed a complaint directly with that office and still has not heard back.

Criminal investigator Fayetta Billie, who was assigned to the case, did not return a phone call by press time Wednesday.

Regina also filed a report with the Apache County Sheriff's Office, which conducted an investigation and concluded there wasn't enough evidence to file charges against Frank.

After Regina reported the incident to the school, Frank was placed on administrative leave for two weeks while the school district investigated. She was cleared and no disciplinary action was taken.

In the meantime, Regina kept Rose out of school, thinking she would hear something from then-principal Sheryl Soderstrom, but she never did. Finally, on Jan. 25, Regina went to Sanders Elementary to find out what had happened and what she should do.

Soderstrom offered to transfer Rose to a different class, but Regina wasn't satisfied with that response.

"I said, 'No, Ms. Frank has to be off campus,'" she recalled.

Soderstrom reportedly replied that that wasn't going to happen. Eventually, Regina decided to transfer her daughter to a different school.

Rose now attends Pine Springs, a Bureau of Indian Education school "12 miles from our house over a nasty, rocky, rough road," Regina said.

Rose is a happy 8-year-old now, but for months after the beating incident she had nightmares and had to be taken to a counselor.

Frank is still teaching in Sanders, but Soderstrom and then-superintendent Alex Martinez have both left the district.

Except for Rose and Frank's conflicting reports, what went on during recess that January day remains a mystery.

"Here it is going on three years, and no one has helped us, no one even listened to us," Regina said. "If that was your daughter, wouldn't you want to know what happened?"

"If someone from the school or the district had at least come to our house and apologized, we probably wouldn't have filed the suit," William said. "We were ignored."

The incident has also traumatized Frank, according to the school district's attorney.

"Our investigation revealed no evidence whatsoever" that Frank struck Rose, attorney Ian Neale wrote in the district's response to the lawsuit. "Ms. Frank has been a valued teacher for many years ... and has been personally devastated by these appalling accusations."