SAN DIEGO — When San Diego Unified School District hired out-of-state prosecutor Farshad Talebi almost two years ago to lead its internal investigations office, he came across a problem: The district didn’t really have a department dedicated to dealing with — or staffed and trained to deal with — complaints of serious and potentially illegal misconduct.

That lack of staffing and expertise directly contributed to San Diego Unified’s failure to protect students from sexual assault and harassment, federal officials found, as they described in a report released by the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights last month.

That report reviewed 253 cases of alleged sexual misconduct against students by staff and other students from 2017 to 2020 and found that San Diego Unified had systematically failed its duties under Title IX, the federal law that prohibits sex-based discrimination in schools.

The problem largely came down to a shortage of qualified staff, Talebi told The San Diego Union-Tribune.

For six years, the district employed a Title IX coordinator with a background in education — not in the law or compliance — and for most of that time expected her to handle Title IX matters for a district of nearly 200 schools by herself. Much of the time, Title IX investigations simply didn’t happen.

In the past year and a half, the district says it has undergone a large-scale reorganization not just of its Title IX responses but of how it handles any complaints alleging violations of state or federal laws.

Much of that work has happened thanks to Talebi, a former Title IX coordinator and state human trafficking task force coordinator who joined the district in January 2023.

Talebi now leads a reorganized department called the Office of Investigations, Compliance and Accountability, replacing the district’s former Quality Assurance Office. In addition to being the district’s main hub for receiving and processing complaints of misconduct, the office is dedicated to investigating sensitive compliance matters, such as sexual misconduct, discrimination and civil rights violations.

The district now also has a new Title IX coordinator with experience in family law and aiding human trafficking victims, and a team of five investigators with backgrounds ranging from law enforcement to child protective services.

District officials said they believe these changes will improve the district’s Title IX compliance and address the problems raised in the federal report.

“We’ve got a really, really good team,” said Anna Ward, the district’s new Title IX coordinator and a family law attorney who most recently worked for the Mississippi attorney general’s office. “I’m really excited about some of this new stuff we’re going to be doing. I think it’s going to make things a lot smoother, to be sure.”

Some community members have questioned whether San Diego Unified is doing enough to respond to and prevent sexual misconduct not just because of the Title IX report, but because of a recent investigation’s finding that former Superintendent Lamont Jackson committed sex-based misconduct with two women who worked in district management.

The school board, which had hired an outside attorney to investigate the allegations, fired Jackson with severance pay at the end of August after the probe found at least some of the allegations credible.

The two employees had not filed complaints with the district about Jackson, according to the attorney’s report summary. It was a board member getting lunch with one of them who learned of the allegations and reported them to the district’s general counsel.

Talebi’s investigations office, which accepts anonymous reports, is generally the department to investigate complaints of alleged employee sexual misconduct. Unlike almost all other departments in the district, Talebi’s office does not fall under the superintendent’s control. Instead, the office reports to the district’s general counsel, who reports to the board.

“I am confident that we’ve been responding in compliance with the regulations, and I think the district in this case responded promptly as we would to any other allegations,” Talebi said of how the board responded to the allegations against Jackson. “I’m proud that the district is responding promptly and there is accountability for violations.”

Few investigations, little follow-up

The federal review had found that in many cases where San Diego Unified students were sexually abused or harassed, the district never conducted a required Title IX investigation.

Each of the 253 case files reviewed by the feds was missing key information and documents, including interview notes, discipline records, police reports, witness statements and records of required follow-ups with students with disabilities. And the district failed to show it had taken needed follow-up action in many cases, such as taking steps to prevent further harassment or providing supports and protections to the student victims, the review found.

The person who served as Title IX coordinator throughout the time period reviewed by the feds had an educational background, not a legal one. She was a vice principal when she was promoted to Title IX coordinator in 2017 under then-Superintendent Cindy Marten, now deputy U.S. education secretary.

Title IX investigations were not handled by professionals who had expertise and training in conducting such investigations or in handling nuanced issues like sexual assault and dating violence, but instead ended up falling to school administrators or human resources officers, Talebi said.

As a result, the district was not following procedures required for such investigations, such as conducting 10-day evidence reviews, having a separate investigator and decision-maker, giving both parties a chance to respond to the evidence, writing an investigation report and providing an appeals process.

Talebi was initially hired to lead what was then the district’s Quality Assurance Office, which received and responded to general complaints and concerns from across the district. Talebi helped change the Quality Assurance Office into the Office of Investigations, Compliance and Accountability and brought Title IX under its umbrella.

In addition to Title IX, the new office now investigates uniform complaints and other formal complaints that allege violations of state or federal laws or regulations.

School administrators and human resources still handle general misconduct. It’s only complaints of serious misconduct that risks violating federal and state laws that Talebi’s office will investigate on its own.

New team, new expertise

Since Talebi joined the investigative office, the district has added other new staff with investigative and legal experience to the department.

In addition to Ward, the former Mississippi attorney who succeeded the district’s retiring Title IX coordinator in 2023, the district also added two more investigators.

The investigator team now includes a retired law enforcement officer with expertise in child exploitation and sex trafficking, two investigators from the San Diego public defender’s office, and an investigator and clinician from Child Protective Services. The investigations office says all of its staff have Title IX training and follow trauma-informed practices.

Talebi himself brings legal and compliance experience: He headed human trafficking task forces for the attorney general’s offices in Washington state and Hawaii, and he was previously the Title IX coordinator for the University of Hawaii.

The investigations office is now in charge of making sure Title IX procedures are followed, that investigations are conducted when required and that support measures are put in place for parties involved. And even for cases where no investigation by the office is needed, the office will follow up with school administrators or department supervisors to ensure the issue is addressed.

Since 2023, Talebi’s team has held in-person Title IX training for school police and all principals, vice principals, high school athletic directors, area superintendents, classified employee supervisors and district department supervisors, he said.

Last school year, the district’s Title IX office received 286 reports of alleged sexual harassment; of those, 48 led to formal Title IX investigations. During each of the previous two school years, the district had received about 340 reports of alleged sexual harassment.

How you can file a complaint

Anyone can report a concern or alleged misconduct in San Diego Unified through the investigations office’s online reporting system, called EthicsPoint. Concerns can be reported anonymously.

Any district employees who become aware of sexual misconduct or harassment toward students or employees are required by district policy to report it within one working day to the Title IX coordinator, which can be done by submitting a report through EthicsPoint or the district’s Title IX staff reporting form, calling the Title IX coordinator at (619) 725-7225 or emailing titleix@sandi.net.

The district’s investigators will only launch probes for serious misconduct that could violate federal or state laws.

Less serious concerns will still be handled by campus administrators. The investigations office generally recommends that parents or students bring up concerns first with their teacher or principal to resolve conflicts.

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