Inappropriate conduct alleged

Brandon J. Volk

LAWRENCEVILLE – A 26-year-old band instructor originally from Olney has been fired from his position with Lawrenceville schools after discovery of an illicit relationship with a student.

And it’s not just any student, either; it’s a local police officer’s daughter, making the situation all the more onerous because the circumstances under which the matter developed are such that she likely should have known what the outcome was going to be, and therefore should have known better.

No charges have been filed in the case of the dismissal of Brandon J. Volk, who was let go from his position in a special session of the school board Tuesday, March 13, so there’s apparently been no evidence (thus far) of an illicit sexual relationship, just a “romantic” one, which is also illicit when it involves a teacher-student relationship.

However, because the student who is Volk’s alleged paramour is the daughter of a local police officer, charges could still be coming, as the girl’s “status” as an officer’s daughter is likely the driving force that lead to the termination action to begin with.

While the school is prohibited from commenting on anything other than action taken against an employee and the basic reason why the action was taken, sources in town have advised of the background.

The young Volk apparently came to Lawrenceville Unit 20 as the band instructor for the 2017-18 school year. On the school website, he “introduced” himself for this particular year, stating that he was a graduate of East Richland High School in Olney, attended Olney Central College, and graduated from Eastern Illinois University in Charleston, majoring in music. On the website, he pointed out that he was married and had a 10-month-old daughter (who would be over a year in age right now).

Featured in the handful of band photos was a member, Graycie Sapp, daughter of Lawrenceville police officer Brandon Sapp.

Ms. Sapp’s mother, Amber Rucker-Sapp-Newlin, is employed by the school district at the junior high library.

At some point in time, a relationship developed between the Sapp girl – who recently turned 18 – and Volk. Sources were unable to state definitively when this occurred, so it’s unclear how long it had been going on.

However, just recently, they were in effect “caught.” Sources in Lawrence couldn’t definitively say if the two were caught together in a compromising situation, or whether there was a note one of the two had sent to the other that was discovered (there seemed to be indication of both).

Whatever the case, the information was taken to Sapp’s mother, and the whole thing kind of blew up from there.

A special meeting of the board of education was called for the March 13 date, and at that meeting, Volk was terminated. The cause of termination as issued in a public statement was for “inappropriate interaction with a student” and “unprofessional misconduct and conduct unbecoming of an educator.”

While Sapp is 18, and while there is no indication at this point in time that there was any sexual aspect to the relationship, it is improper for any employee of a school district to have any kind of romantic relationship with any student, of-age or not.

Had there been an sexual relationship alleged, charges could still be filed despite the fact that the Sapp girl is of age, because the band teacher is in a position of “trust, supervision or authority” over the alleged victim.

Whether any further investigation is underway, or all of that has been gone over and cleared up with no further wrongdoing, is unknown.

What is known is that there has been a growing number of these types of cases in the past decade or so. Nearly every school in Disclosure’s coverage area has suffered some sort of problem with student-teacher “relationships,” up to and including those of a sexual nature that ended in charges.

There appears to be no easy solution to the problem, either. Upon first glance at this particular instance, one might be inclined to think “Oh, 26 is too young to be around hypersexualized teens” who are hormone-driven and are given no positive direction against acting out on the hormone drive, but instead are encouraged in every form of media and entertainment to just “do what they want.” However, teachers and coaches of every age have gotten in trouble with the teens over the past decade or so, and so it appears that age has nothing to do with it as a factor.

Careful monitoring of student-instructor interaction might be a viable solution, but with the diminishing number of people going into the field of education, which results in the hiring of someone just out of college as well as increased student-to-teacher ratio, that’s not really possible, either.

Unfortunately, the bottom line ultimately comes down to parents not being aware of what their kids are into at school. Just like with school shootings, distant, absent, irresponsible or immature parents have lead to increasingly-aberrant behavior in kids of all ages.

In the case of the Sapps, Brandon Sapp was one of the original “punk cops” covered 15 years ago in Disclosure who not only beat restrained subjects, engaged in other brutalization of people they are tasked with ‘protecting and serving,’ and perhaps more importantly, behaved very badly at parties held by the cops, for the cops, where sleazy behavior on the part of both the cops and their wives was the rule, according to eyewitnesses who continually reported to Disclosure about these repulsive practices. Sapp, Tyler Parrot (long ago terminated), Dennis York (same) and Billy “PeeWee” Darnell (relegated to his tiny realm of St. Francisville after causing people to wreck in multiple high-speed chases, some of them severely injured, one of them killed) were among the worst offenders, with tales of hot tub antics and wives giving “boob shots” (shots of alcohol served from their cleavage) being documented by horrified party-goers who promptly left as soon as the action got lewd.

Amber Rucker-Sapp-Newlin herself was among that number, and her current incarnation isn’t much changed, as by the looks of her social media, she is still behaving as if she’s an entitled teenager and drama mama, teaching some sort of dance class in the impoverished Lawrenceville area.

Sadly, that kind of thing is far too common in Lawrence and surrounding counties, and kind of leaves kids floundering with little (or bad) guidance…and when kids have no guidance, they fall into bad behavior of different types.

And sadly, the biggest losers in the entire debacle are the wife and infant of Volk, not “losers” in the sense of the punk cops or drama mamas or being related to them, but in the sense that they’re the ones who will have suffered the most when all is said and done.