CHESTERFIELD COUNTY, Va. -- Police have arrested and charged another Chesterfield Early Childhood Learning Academy teacher with assaulting students at the county preschool.
In just a month's time, police have now placed a total of 14 charges against two teachers for allegedly assaulting seven different children at the same school.
Kathleen R. Harlow, 65, was recently charged with two counts of misdemeanor assault in connection to alleged assaults on children ages four or younger.
"On April 14, 2023, police received a referral from Child Protective Services (CPS) that reported a teacher, identified as Kathleen R. Harlow, 65, had assaulted a student at the school on April 13, 2023," a Chesterfield Police spokesperson wrote in an email. "While police and CPS personnel investigated this reported assault, detectives learned of an earlier assault involving the same teacher and a different student; this assault reportedly occurred on Dec. 8, 2022."
Child Protective Services did not report the December alleged assault to police.
"That incident was referred to CPS. However, it was screened out. But once CPS and the detective were looking into what ended up being the second incident, then they reopened the first incident and looked into that as well," Chesterfield Police Capt. Michael Breeden told CBS 6.
Breeden said the school reported both incidents to CPS but not law enforcement, which is not a violation of state mandatory reporting laws or Chesterfield School Board policy.
Breenden would not go into detail about the nature of the latest assault allegations, but he mentioned the teacher's alleged actions were outside the criteria laid out in the state code in which a teacher can make physical contact with a student.
"Teachers have the ability to do things. They are allowed to touch students. They're allowed to break up a fight or if a kid is trying to hurt another kid or a teacher, there are certain things that they are allowed to do," Breeden said. "These allegations were outside of those parameters."
The nature of the alleged abuse did not require the children to be hospitalized.
"The employee will not return to the school division pending adjudication of the charges," Chesterfield Schools spokesperson Shawn Smith said.
Harlow's arrest comes weeks after another teacher at the same preschool faced similar accusations followed by criminal charges.
Chesterfield Police said the parents of a female student reached out to police on Sunday, March 5, 2023, to report their child had been assaulted by her teacher the previous November.
“The parents had already reported this to the school and they were not satisfied with the results that they were given. So then they reached out to us to report the assault and battery," Breeden said in a March interview.
After that call, special victims' detectives started looking into the case and discovered other complaints about the teacher, identified as 57-year-old Lisa M. Harbilas, were being investigated by the school system, according to Breeden.
Detectives said Harbilas assaulted three other students in November 2022 and one student in August 2022, Breeden said.
She was charged with 12 counts of misdemeanor assault.
In the November incidents, court documents revealed a teacher's aid witnessed Harbilas become frustrated with the students and then spanked them, grabbed their necks, pulled their hair, and smacked their faces.
In the August incident, court documents showed Harbilas pulled a child's hair and put her legs over the child to prevent them from moving.
Police said neither Child Protective Services nor the school district reported any of those alleged assaults to the police department, despite a state code that mandates Child Protective Services to report any injury or threatened injury to a child to law enforcement.
Police said they only found out about the alleged assaults after an upset parent came forward. The parent learned the school allowed Harbilas to return to school and went to law enforcement.
CBS 6 asked Chesterfield-Colonial Heights Social Services Director Kiva Rogers why CPS screened out cases in which police found evidence of alleged crimes.
Rogers responded saying, "Child Protective Services doesn’t share the same authority to investigate complaints that law enforcement has granted to it under the law. As state policy specifies, certain specific circumstances and criteria must be established in a complaint before CPS can even initiate an investigation. Law enforcement, on the other hand, has broad discretion to initiate an investigation of any complaint, and it is not uncommon for additional information to be gathered during the course of a police investigation than what may have been shared when a complaint was made to Child Protective Services."
Breeden said since Harbilas was arrested and CPS came under scrutiny for its handling of those allegations, he's seen an increase in the number of referrals from CPS.
"On the surface, it looks like the referrals have doubled in size since the first incident with Ms. Harbilas. So, we are getting a lot more," Breeden said.
He encouraged parents who may be concerned about how cases are handled, to reach out to Chesterfield Police.
"If you have something that has happened and you're not satisfied, or you don't get an answer, you can always give us a call," Breeden said.
Earlier this month, Chesterfield Police Chief Jeffrey Katz said he hoped local policies and state law would change after Chesterfield Public Schools did not report the preschool allegations to police.
“If we're not aware of a situation, we can't help, and so it's frustrating for us," Katz said in an April 20 interview.
Police continue to investigate the alleged assaults and asked anyone with information to call Chesterfield Police at 804-748-1251.
Depend on CBS 6 News and WTVR.com for in-depth coverage of this important local story. Anyone with more information can email newstips@wtvr.com to send a tip.
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