ORLANDO, Fla. - School officials said Wednesday that they can’t find any evidence to suggest that a kindergartner was told not to pray in a Seminole County elementary lunchroom.
“We found zero evidence an incident ever occurred,” said district spokesman Mike Lawrence. “There’s no proof whatsoever.”
A district attorney sent a letter to the girl’s family and their lawyer outlining their conclusions.
“We apologized for the incident she believes occurred, but there was nothing warranted or found” in the investigation, Lawrence said.
Five-year-old Gabriella Perez told her parents that in March a staff member at Carillon Elementary in Oviedo stopped her from praying over her lunch.
Her father, Marcos Perez, who works for a Christian-book publisher in Lake Mary that is promoting a book about the “attack on traditional values” in America, demanded an investigation and apology from the school.
Earlier this month, the girl and her parents described the incident to school officials. According to Lawrence, she couldn’t identify a staff member from a selection of photos provided by the district but instead identified a member from the school’s website.
As for the identified staff member, a school district investigator has concluded that “there is no way possible that person was anywhere near the lunchroom” that kindergartners and first-graders use. In addition to the student and her family, the district has interviewed staff members, the accused adult and Gabriella’s classmates, Lawrence said.
Perez and family attorney Jeremiah Dys could not immediately be reached for comment Wednesday.
The girl’s allegations spurred national news coverage by Fox News and conservative Christian publications, and the school received threatening phone calls.
“For what the school endured, this is very vindicating,” Lawrence said.
Front Section, Pages 2 on 04/24/2014