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Three years ago, Susan Romanyszyn was a finalist for a prestigious national math teaching award, a woman praised for her creative skills in the classroom.
Today, she is on trial in Bucks County Court, accused of dashing that reputation with a barrage of harrowing threats planted anonymously in the Warminster elementary school where she taught fourth grade.
Romanyszyn, 46, disavows the 18 felony charges against her. "I'm looking forward to the truth coming out," she told reporters today as jury selection began.
The Warminster woman is accused of crafting and planting 17 threats throughout Longstreth Elementary School between Oct. 11 and 19, creating fear and disruption among teachers, students and parents.
Most were violently worded messages on pieces of paper or walls. Childishly scrawled, occasionally illustrated with juvenile drawings, and frequently misspelled or obscene, the messages warned of bombs, shootings, stabbings and death.
Some examples:
"[Expletive] Bomb Today."
"To shool, I have wepons and nife . . . die today kill em all."
"I wont stop til you all die."
Nails were scattered across the faculty parking lot. And a fifth grader opened her desk one morning to find a fake bomb - a plastic bottle containing white powder and screws.
Romanyszyn was arrested Jan. 31 on 17 charges of terroristic threats. Prosecutors today filed an additional felony charge of manufacturing a fake explosive device.
The alleged motive? Authorities say Romanyszyn, who had taught middle school math for seven years, was seething over not being given a fifth-grade assignment after transferring to Longstreth.
The Centennial School District, where she had worked for 10 years, fired her shortly after her arrest.
She also was diagnosed with cancer after her arrest, and wore a long scarf over her head in court.
The bizarre case has prompted inquiries from TV networks and newspapers across the country, said Sara Webster, Romanyszyn's attorney.
Webster tried to have the courtroom closed to the public today until a jury could be chosen and instructed not to read news accounts of the trial. "I want to get a jury that is untainted," she told reporters during a break.
Judge Rea B. Boylan refused the request, but agreed to place pretrial motions under seal. Opening statements are expected tomorrow morning.
A former accountant, Romanyszyn was teaching at Klinger Middle School in 2005 when chosen as one of two Pennsylvania finalists for a Presidential Award for Excellence in Mathematics.
The threats at Longstreth left the school in a bunker mentality. Backpacks were searched. Field trips and other activities were canceled. Fifth graders, who typically rotate among three classrooms, were confined to their homerooms. Warminster police installed surveillance cameras.
Romanyszyn and Webster have said that the teacher was used as a scapegoat by police and school officials, who were desperate to placate outraged Longstreth parents. A handwriting expert failed to link Romanyszyn's writing samples to the threats, and no bomb-related Web sites turned up on searches of her school or home computers.
But prosecutors say they have a strong, if circumstantial, case against her. Romanyszyn's fingerprints were found on two threat-bearing sheets of paper, and surveillance videos show her coming and going from areas of the school shortly before some of the threats were discovered there.
Police interviewed Romanyszyn at the school in October. When confronted with suspicions about her involvement, she ended the interview and asked to speak to a lawyer.
School officials, aware of the suspicions, suspended her with pay that day. As Romanyszyn gathered her belongings and left, she made one last comment to the district superintendent, according to court records.
"You are making a mistake," she said.
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