A tentative agreement has been reached between the Wake County school system and a former Enloe High School teacher who filed a lawsuit after he was punished for inviting an anti-Islamic speaker to speak with his students.
Billy Strickland, Robert Escamilla’s attorney, said he couldn’t disclose the terms of the deal that was reached this afternoon until July 1. He said the agreement was contingent upon the school district performing some actions that he couldn’t disclose yet.
“It’s not the best thing we could have gotten, but it wasn’t the worst,” Strickland said.
Escamilla was suspended in February 2007 after he invited an Egyptian born Christian evangelist to speak at Enloe. Some parents, the ACLU and the Council on American-Islamic Relations complained about how the speaker had denounced Islam and warned female students not to marry Muslim men.
Escamilla was later reprimanded and sent to work at Phillips High School, an alternative school. The school board also released negative parts of his personnel file to justify its decision not to accept Escamilla’s request to be transferred back ton Enloe.
Escamilla filed a lawsuit in November alleging that his due process rights had been violated.