A tie vote Thursday stopped an effort by three members of the Haverhill School Committee to officially request copies of city records dealing with their colleague, Scott W. Wood Jr.
Committee member Richard J. Rosa made the motion asking that Mayor James J. Fiorentini and the City of Haverhill provide the Committee with all unredacted documents relating to an investigation conducted by Haverhill Deputy Police Chief Donald Thompson in 2013, as well as another conducted by Haverhill Detective Richard Welch in 2020 and a third conducted by Haverhill Police Capt. Meaghan Paré in 2022.
Additionally, Rosa requested “The alleged contract between the City of Haverhill and the School Committee member Scott Wood, requiring that the city destroy the 2013 report that retired Police Chief Alan DeNaro allegedly used as the basis for not hiring Mr. Wood and the civil complaint filed against the city of Haverhill by school committee member Scott Wood.”
Last week, Rosa and fellow committee member Paul A. Magliocchetti said they were “disappointed and saddened” by the comments depicted in a decade-old background check, while affirming that “Hate speech in any form cannot be tolerated.”
Rosa’s motion called for the release of all material by 5 p.m. next Thursday, June 29.
Background checks by Thompson and Paré came to light this month when Wood called attention to them in his lawsuit against the city and former and current Chiefs of Police Anthony Haugh and Robert P. Pistone. The suit alleges the parties resurfaced allegations of Wood using racist language and engaging in inappropriate behavior during his previous stints as a college police officer. These, in turn, cost Wood his Haverhill and Wenham police jobs in 2021 and 2022.
School Committee members did not walk in lockstep on the matter, however. Committee member Toni Sapienza-Donais said she believes this discussion had no place being part of the School Committee agenda.
“As a Haverhill School Committee member, this discussion bothers me to my very core. To make allegations against a member of this Committee to me is simply outrageous and something I will not be part of,” she said.
Donais said she feared the discussion “threatens to fracture this committee,” calling it a “sad night for the integrity of the School Committee.”
For his part, Wood said because there is pending litigation, he could only say the allegations against him, as detailed in Haverhill Police background checks, are simply untrue.
“But, I will forcefully say it’s fabricated and it’s untrue and when the truth comes out a lot of people are going to look pretty bad,” he said.
Ultimately, the motion failed to muster enough votes to pass with Committee members Gail M. Sullivan, Rosa and Magliocchetti in favor while Maura L. Ryan-Ciardiello, Donais and Wood against. Mayor James J. Fiorentini, chairman of the School Committee, was not present to cast a tie-breaking vote.