Posted on September 24, 2015

Long Island Teacher Claims She Got Blame for Student’s Sexual Assault Threat, Claims Backlash Was Racially Motivated

John Marzulli, NY Daily News, September 23, 2015

A Long Island high school teacher who was threatened with sexual assault by a student claims in a new lawsuit that she was retaliated against by school officials in Hempstead for reporting the vile threat to authorities.

Lynne Albuquerque, a science teacher, alleged the backlash was racially motivated because she is white.

The student and the school officials are black.

The student, identified in the suit only by his initials “N.L.,” allegedly threatened Albuquerque in the classroom on May 9, 2014.

“When I get done ramming you, I’m gonna bag your daughter, then ram the bitch through the whole gang,” N.L. said, according to the suit filed in Brooklyn Federal Court.

Albuquerque notified the school district, the police and the Nassau County district attorney’s office.

The student was suspended for three days, but the penalty was later reversed, Albuquerque’s lawyer Steven Morelli said.

Albuquerque was accused by a school administrator of instigating the incident. The teacher was slapped with disciplinary charges by Assistant Superintendent Rodney Gilmore relating to a workers’ compensation claim she filed for emotional trauma.

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Albuquerque is the third white employee of the Hempstead Union Free School District to file a federal suit alleging racial discrimination by district officials, Morelli said.

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