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Pavlik v. Chinle Unified School District No. 243/11/1999
ing in investigatory techniques tainted the witnesses.
The record does not show whether Pavlik knew the subject of the investigation, but it also does not reflect that he asked for a reason for his suspension until just before the Board meeting at which his case was to be considered. The record does show, however, that when his lawyer asked for a statement of the charges and a continuance to enable Pavlik to prepare a defense, both requests were promptly granted, and Pavlik was invited to submit a response to the charges. In his response, Pavlik admitted most of the factual allegations, but took the position that they were not serious enough to warrant termination.
At the two-day hearing before the Board, Pavlik confronted and cross examined the witnesses against him, including the person who had investigated the allegations. He presented thirteen witnesses and thirteen exhibits of his own. He never suggested that his ability to present a case had been hampered or constrained, nor did he request a continuance to allow him to present more evidence.
The presence of procedural irregularities does not require setting aside the finding of an administrative board unless a party was prejudiced by the irregularities. See DeFries v. School Dist. No. 13 of Cochise County, 116 Ariz. 83, 86, 567 P.2d 1212, 1215 (App. 1977); Barrow v. Arizona Bd. of Regents, 158 Ariz. 71, 79, 761 P.2d 145, 153 (App. 1988). Even assuming that the District should have given Pavlik notice of the accusations as soon as he was placed on administrative leave, we nonetheless conclude that the record does not demonstrate that he was prejudiced by the failure to do so. Several reasons support our Conclusion.
First, nothing prevented Pavlik from asking why he was being placed on administrative leave, and nothing kept him from consulting a lawyer as soon as he was placed on leave.
Second, although Pavlik accuses the District's investigator of shaping the evidence against him, he does not dispute most of the evidence and he concedes that any influence by the investigator was unwitting. He points to only one example in the record of the investigator asking leading questions and does not show how the question or the response to it might have harmed him. A review of that item shows that the investigator did ask students whether Pavlik had ever hugged or touched them. But the students' responses, read in their entirety, suggest both spontaneity and restraint on the part of the students. The statements do not suggest that the students felt pressured to respond in a particular way. Pavlik's suggestion that the witnesses were unduly influenced is speculative.
Third, the thrust of Pavlik's defense was that the allegations against him did not warrant termination, not that they were not true. Since Pavlik conceded the facts, we do not see how interviewing the witnesses before they were "tainted" by the District's investigator would have made any difference in the outcome.
As long as Pavlik was afforded due process, defects in proceedings that did not prejudice his rights do not require upsetting the administrative decision. See Connor v. Board of Educ., 136 Ariz. 11, 17-18, 663 P.2d 1002, 1008-09 (App. 1982). Pavlik was provided the opportunity to attack the District's case and to present his own. The trial court abused its discretion in concluding that any irregularity prejudiced Pavlik.
CONCLUSION
We reverse the trial court's holdings that the Board had a disqualifying pecuniary interest in Mr. Pavlik's termination, that his due process rights were violated when the Board rendered a decision in his case, and that being placed on pa
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