Former Principal Pleads Guilty To Assault On Boy Onetime St. Patrick’s Administrator Says He Was Horsing Around With Boy

Seeking to avoid a second trial on sex crime charges, the former principal of St. Patrick’s Elementary School in north Spokane pleaded guilty Monday to third-degree assault.

Donald R. Andrews Jr., 40, was fired by the Catholic Diocese and the school two years ago after the parents of a 13-year-old student said the principal molested their son while he was visiting Andrews’ house.

Andrews denied the charge during a jury trial last year, insisting his relationship with the boy was like any principal-student friendship.

His plea statement entered Monday said: “I acted in a criminally negligent way and caused harm to (the youth) while wrestling and horsing around. It is my desire to bring closure to this matter.”

Andrews’ trial last year on a charge of child molestation ended in a hung jury. Eleven of 12 jurors voted to acquit him.

County Prosecutor Jim Sweetser decided to retry Andrews, a move Andrews’ attorney, Mark Vovos, called “unheard of, considering the previous jury outcome.”

Jury selection was to have started this week in Spokane County Superior Court.

Andrews will be sentenced April 14. The standard range for a person with no prior criminal record is from one to three months in jail for third-degree assault.

“We knew another trial would have been hard on us,” said the father of the boy who said he was assaulted. “We’re glad we don’t have to go through that stress again.”

A felony conviction usually causes a teacher to lose or have his teaching certificate suspended, said Rick Wilson, staff attorney with the state office of the superintendent of instruction.

Any action by the SPI office would occur after a review of the case, Wilson said.

Andrews was the principal and an English teacher at the school for three years before the incident.

Police investigators said Andrews had two students from St. Patrick’s spend the night at his house in February 1995.

One of the boys told police they were watching a movie when Andrews put his arm around the boy’s shoulder and then fondled him.

The student ran to a bathroom and stayed there while Andrews apologized for his action, the investigation report said.

The 13-year-old told his parents of the incident about a month later.

“This is the appropriate solution to this charge,” Deputy Prosecutor Mary Ann Brady said. “The victim’s and his family’s wishes certainly had some bearing on this decision.”

, DataTimes