By LeAnn R. Ralph
MENOMONIE — A substitute teacher in the Boyceville school district charged with one misdemeanor count of disorderly conduct has reached a deferred prosecution agreement and will complete 40 hours of community service as part of the agreement.
Mark G. Mastalir, age 62, of Menomonie, along with his attorney Michael Fairchild, appeared in Dunn County Circuit Court before Judge Luke M. Wagner March 28 for a plea hearing.
Mastalir entered a plea of “no contest” for the charge of disorderly conduct in connection with an incident involving a student, but Judge Wagner did not accept the plea, and instead, accepted the 12-month deferred acceptance of a guilty plea (DAGP) agreement, according to online court records.
Dunn County Assistant District Attorney Amber Hahn asked the court to accept the joint agreement and to stipulate that Mastalir does not need to appear in court for the one-year review hearing if he has completed the terms of the agreement, which includes 40 hours of community service.
A deferred prosecution hearing is scheduled in Dunn County Circuit Court for April 3, 2023.
According to the complaint, Boyceville Police Chief Greg Lamkin was contacted December 3, 2021, about an incident of disorderly conduct at Tiffany Creek Elementary in Boyceville.
School personnel told Police Chief Lamkin about an 11-year-old student who was complaining that a teacher had injured him.
A school administrator, who noted the boy had a red mark on his upper right chest, said the boy was crying and had said a substitute art teacher had shoved him into a door and injured his ribs.
When the administrator talked to other students who had been in the classroom, the students said Mastalir had asked the boy to leave the classroom, but the boy refused, and Mastalir then began shoving the boy and shoved him out into the hallway, according to the complaint.
The administrator asked Mastalir about the boy, and the substitute teacher said the boy was not listening and was screaming and shoving other students. When Mastalir told the boy to go to the office, he refused. When Mastalir was asked if he had laid hands on the boy, he said he had not, the complaint states.
The administrator reviewed video from a camera in the hallway and then asked Nick Kaiser, school district administrator to view the video. After that, the administrator and Kaiser told Police Chief Lamkin that they wanted him to review the video.
According to the complaint, Police Chief Lamkin observed on the video that around 3 p.m., students went into the classroom, and at 3:08 p.m., he observed an adult male using both hands to shove a male student. The boy hit the doorframe, and the man pushed the boy again out into the hallway. The man went back into the classroom, and the student was crying and holding his right side. The boy then walked down the hallway where another teacher came out and spoke to him briefly.
The other teacher reported to the administrator that he had heard a student crying in the hallway and that the boy had told the teacher, “He pushed me into the door and hurt my ribs!” “He” was confirmed to mean the substitute art teacher, and when the boy was asked what happened, the boy said he would not do his work, so the teacher had pushed him out of the room and had hurt his ribs, according to the criminal complaint.
