Every so often during a sleepless night, Melody Romo searches online for the high school band teacher who lured her into a sexual relationship when she was 15.
She rarely finds much. But in August, there was a cryptic post in a public forum: The teacher, Mike Stevens, had been let go by a marching band group in the Pacific Northwest. In the dark, Romo searched further, until she found out why.
Other young women had accused him of sexual misconduct.
Romo was stunned. Years ago, when their secret spread from the band students at her San Antonio high school to parents, the principal, and then police, Romo believed what Stevens had always told her: If anyone found out, his career would be over.
Instead, Stevens got a second chance — in drum and bugle corps, a marching band circuit that draws some of the country’s most devoted young performers. Over nearly a decade at the Oregon Crusaders, a Portland drum corps, Stevens would continue to engage in inappropriate relationships with teens and young women.
“The feeling was surreal,” Romo said of the discovery. “I was preyed on. I was coerced. And I’m not the only one.”
An investigation by the Inquirer found nearly a dozen cases over the last decade in which teachers who had been disciplined for misconduct with students went on to work in drum corps as instructors, administrators, or judges. The inquiry also turned up several others with records that include crimes of a sexual nature. Taken together the examples highlight worrisome flaws — and an unusual tolerance for past sexual misdeeds — in the hiring practices of an activity that draws thousands of young participants each year. Among the findings:
- Nearly half of the 24 World Class drum corps have employed at least one former teacher previously disciplined for misconduct with a student. The misconduct records, in many cases, are publicly available online.
- In some instances, corps administrators knew about applicants’ blemished backgrounds but hired them regardless.
- Criminal background checks were not required by the activity’s governing body, Drum Corps International (DCI), until 2017; there are still no national guidelines regarding hiring someone with a record.
The shortcomings have not been lost on drum corps participants and fans. Last year, an online petition calling on DCI to “protect students from sex offenders and sexual misconduct by staff” drew more than 2,000 signatures. Online drum corps forums have long hosted conversations about corps’ lax hiring practices and instructors with checkered pasts.
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Tricia L. Nadolny