NEW YORK (1010 WINS) — A Manhattan high school principal quit amidst accusations of sexual assault against a teacher, officials said.
John Colin, a special education teacher at Lower Manhattan Arts Academy filed a complaint with the State Division of Human Rights last year against the school’s principal, Derek Premo, alleging Premo sexually harassed him at a staff holiday party in 2019, the New York Post reported.
According to the complaint, Premo approached Colin and two female employees during the party and pressed his groin against him under the bar-height table for the entirety of the 20-minute conversation.
“It was very uncomfortable because I could feel his penis on my leg, and he was leaning his face very close to mine,” Colin stated. “Then he started telling me about how he and his husband liked to have parties,” while “looking directly into my eyes.”
Colin said he put off filing a complaint in the immediate aftermath due to the pandemic but eventually did so a year after the incident.
The DOE said the state case is still pending.
Premo was previously accused of inappropriately touching a student in his previous job at Life Sciences Secondary School on the Upper East Side. The complaint was unsubstantiated, officials said.
Premo has been on leave since Thanksgiving.
In a Wednesday email to families from Manhattan High School Superintendent Vivien Orlen, the superintendent announced Premo’s resignation while also praising him for his work during the pandemic and for increasing the graduation rate.
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