The special grand jury investigating Loudoun County Public Schools’ response to the rape and sexual assault of two girls has indicted former county superintendent Scott Ziegler.
Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares (R) on Monday unsealed the indictment of Ziegler, who faces three misdemeanor charges.
Ziegler is indicted on one count of false publication, one count of prohibited conduct, and one count of penalizing an employee for a court appearance. Ziegler could face up to one year in jail.
Miyares’s office also unsealed the indictment of district communications director Wayde Byard, who is facing a felony perjury charge for lying under oath. Byard’s charges have a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison.
“The Office of the Attorney General will be prosecuting these cases and has no further comment on this matter,” the announcement states.
These indictments come after some members of the school board took a “victory lap” and attempted to paint the report as a win because there were no criminal charges.
Ziegler was fired from his position December 6 following a damning report on the assaults — which many, including Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R), believe shows evidence of a cover-up, saying, “they tried to cover it up.”
Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin says he wasn’t surprised by the early pushback he and the AG received when they started the special grand jury investigation into how Loudoun County Public Schools mishandled sexual assaults.
“It suggests that they tried to cover it up.” – Youngkin pic.twitter.com/2l0gLUGINo
— Nick Minock (@NickMinock) December 11, 2022
In the report, Ziegler is accused of lying about his knowledge of the rape of a high school girl by a skirt-clad male allowed to use the women’s restroom.
As Breitbart News reported, the special grand jury, empaneled by Miyares, found that the board was derelict in its duty to students and failed to cooperate with a special grand jury investigation, saying administrators “failed at every juncture.”
In May and October of 2021, a male student sexually assaulted two female students in the district. The perpetrator was allowed merely to change schools after the initial assault — at Stone Bridge High School — and the skirt-clad male reportedly sodomized a ninth-grade girl.
Administrators in the district were self-interested, according to the report, which alleges that the second assault — at Broad Run High School — could have been prevented.
Youngkin, who signed the Executive Order directing Miyares to empanel the grand jury, told ABC 7 News he “wasn’t shocked at all” with the findings of the grand jury.
“The fact that it took an election, a new governor and on day one an executive order to get this get to get this investigated, I think really speaks to the fact that I think the Loudoun County School Board let everyone down and didn’t do their job,” he said.
Breccan F. Thies is a reporter for Breitbart News. You can follow him on Twitter @BreccanFThies.
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