By RANDY CHOW, ASHLEY BURKETT and MAXIMO LEGASPE
Anne Arundel County school board candidate Chuck Yocum made headlines when the Baltimore Banner reported earlier this month that he was accused and acquitted of child sexual abuse three decades ago.
But he’s not the only Maryland school board candidate to have faced legal issues of one sort or another. Alverne W. Chesterfield, a Somerset County candidate, had a peace order issued against him in 2022 which, he said, was tied to a dispute with a neighbor. And the state filed a tax lien against St. Mary’s County candidate Brandie Edelen back in 2019.
The Local News Network found those two issues in a review of the Maryland and federal court records of all 109 school board candidates in the state. LNN did not find court records of Yocum’s 1994 acquittal on a charge of child sex abuse, meaning the records were likely expunged after a jury found him not guilty.
The review found far fewer legal issues among school board candidates than LNN found two years ago. In the 2022 election, LNN found 12 candidates who had faced tax liens and a Charles County candidate who had been charged with shoplifting multiple times.
This year, the most serious alleged offense among Maryland school board candidates involved Yocum.
Yocum, who was a special education and social studies teacher at Anne Arundel County’s Northeast High School, was indicted on charges of child sexual abuse and perverted practices, The Washington Post reported more than 30 years ago.
Terrie Jahnigen Warfield, who says she testified against Yocum, said in a social media post last week that she had sexual relations with Yocum when she was 16 years old.
“I was emotionally, physically, mentally abused [by Yocum],” Warfied said. “I deserve justice, and so does everyone else that he’s hurt.”
Contacted by LNN and asked for a response to the allegations, Yocum referenced a statement from Warfield’s mother, Kathy Burkhard. LNN could not independently verify the statement, but on Monday, the Baltimore Sun quoted Burkhard as saying of her daughter: “She is incapable of telling the truth. I’ve had problems with her since she was almost 15.”
Although Yocum was found not guilty of criminal charges, school officials launched a thorough internal investigation, according to The Banner, to determine the validity of allegations that Yocum sexually harassed or made inappropriate comments to students as young as 13.
“Mr. Yocum was found not guilty of sexual abuse in a criminal court. This investigation, however, reviewed additional allegations against Mr. Yocum which were not criminal behaviors but possibly indicative of misconduct or immorality,” stated the school’s internal investigative report from 1994, which was reviewed by The Banner.
Yocum never returned to teaching after the Anne Arundel County Public Schools investigation, The Banner reported.
Six Anne Arundel Democrats, including County Executive Steuart Pittman, have called for Yocum to drop out of the school board race, citing the allegations of child sexual abuse against him, The Banner reported.
The other legal issues that the Local News Network uncovered in its review of the school board candidates are far less serious than those surrounding Yocum.
LNN found that Alverne W. “Chet” Chesterfield, who is running for the Board of Education in Somerset County’s District 2, had a peace order issued against him on May 31, 2022, which was valid through Dec. 6 of that year.
The order states: “Shall Not Abuse, Shall Not Contact, Shall Not Enter Residence,” but the court order does not detail the circumstances that led to the peace order or name the person who requested it.
When asked for comment about the peace order, Chesterfield told LNN: “It is not nothing to really comment on. It was just a dispute between myself and my neighbor regarding property line. That’s all.”
He said the disagreement was taken to court, and the matter was solved.
“It is nothing serious,” he said.
LNN also found that Brandie Edelen, who is running for an at-large school board seat in St. Mary’s County, had a state tax lien filed against her in 2019 because of $594.04 in back taxes.
Edelen said that at the time, she and her family were dealing with funeral expenses and the disposition of the estate of her late father, who passed away in March 2019. She said she got distracted and “simply forgot to file the tax returns.” Filed in May of 2019, the lien was resolved and the tax paid in 2020.
The LNN review of candidate court records also found liens and other tax cases that may have been connected with other candidates, but could not be conclusively tied to those candidates based on court and State Board of Elections records. This happened in several cases where candidates have common first and last names.
LNN only reported on candidates where birthdates and addresses conclusively proved they were the person involved in those court cases.
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