PARIS — Oxford Hills law enforcement responded to two school-related incidents last week. The first was resolved when the school resource officer escorted an unauthorized and unstable visitor from Oxford Hills Comprehensive High School and advised them to not return.
The second involved a weeks-long issue of a disabled child being bullied on the bus, which escalated until the mother of the child made statements that resulted in her arrest for terrorizing.
According to a statement from Paris Police Chief Michael Dailey, Aranka Matolcsy of Paris was arrested last Friday as a result of statements she made to school officials that prompted OHCHS to be placed on lockdown.
In his statement, Dailey said that Matolcsy, who was “upset over transportation issues involving her child and the district, told two separate staff members at the District Office she would drive her vehicle into the high school to get ‘everyone’s attention’. Matolcsy, followed these conversations up with a social media post in which she asked, ‘If I drive my car into the side of the high school do you think it’ll be enough of a PR nightmare for transportation to take me seriously when I say I’m absolutely desperate for…to have a safe and appropriate ride?’ The post was later deleted.”
Matolcsy, who was taken into custody by Maine State Police while she was in Dixfield, was transported to the Oxford County Jail where she posted $100 cash bail and was released Friday. She was charged with terrorizing, a Class C felony punishable by up to five years in jail and a $5,000 fine, and is scheduled to be in court in Paris at 1 p.m. March 9. According to a corrections officer at the jail, she is barred from returning to the high school and is not to contact any staff.
Reached for comment Friday, SAD 17 Superintendent Heather Manchester said in a statement to the Advertiser Democrat, “There was a threat reported that was checked out and taken care of. There was a working lockdown while it was investigated.”
When asked about Matolcsy being arrested, Manchester said she could not comment on the actions taken by police.
“This is the second year that my child has faced the same bully,” Matolcsy said in a written statement to the newspaper. “There was a sudden van and driver change in November. It took me a couple of weeks to realize that this change caused a sudden eruption in my child of violent behavior and severe opposition to school. He went from enthusiastically looking forward to getting on the van and going to school every morning, to punching me in the face, kicking and screaming to not get on the van.”
Matolcsy’s child has Down syndrome, autism spectrum disorder and attention deficit disorder and is unable to verbally express when he feels threatened. She said his only effective communications are to declare “no” and resist the threat. Then, in December, Matolcsy saw that the child who had previously bullied her son in school and had been separated from him by school officials, was again harassing him on the van.
“I immediately questioned the van driver why I had not been notified of the obvious behavior problems on the van,” she wrote. “I reported this to the transportation service and the school district on Dec. 22. Between that date and Jan. 13, I emailed, called, and texted [SAD 17’s] special education director, the bus garage director, the transportation service director, my son’s teachers and ed tech, and our third party case manager over a dozen times to express my inability to continue transporting and my desperation to get him to and from school safely.”
Matolcsy also said that after the high school was placed in lockdown she spoke with law enforcement and agreed she would go to the Paris Police Department to be charged after she completed a work commitment. Instead, she was arrested by state police an hour away from home.
“I had to leave my my elderly dog who was forced to freeze in my locked car for 4 hours,” she said. “I came back to her being held by a stranger after they broke into my car to get her out.
“As a 54-year-old woman with absolutely no criminal history, who has worked in a capacity of service and advocacy in (the Oxford Hills) community for most of her life, this entire situation is horrifying. It is a blatant example of the brokenness of systems intended to protect the most vulnerable.
“There’s a much larger story here than anyone knows about my relationship with the school district. In time my story will come out with details and evidence of systematic failures within this school district that led to this outcome.
“I am absolutely horrified by what happened for everyone involved but most of all for my child.”
Following the arrest, Matolcsy posted that she has been barred from having contact with any school district personnel according to her bond and currently cannot transport her child to or from his school.
Friends have started a GoFundMe account for mother and child that reads in part: “This is a mother living in constant survival mode. She desperately needs safe and appropriate education and transportation for her child so she can work for the money that pays her mortgage while he is in school. Their home is the only security they have in the world.”
Nicole Carter — 207-780-9077
ncarter@sunmediagroup.net
Comments are not available on this story.
Send questions/comments to the editors.
