They took the position to sound the alarm and free the school of a Miss Hall master, who claim that he was pressed in them. They felt validated when an independent investigation concluded that the administrators of the POSH Private Massachusetts School could no longer protect them other students from a accused sexual predator.
But Melissa Fares and Hilary Simon say that the 60 -page report, which was published last week after an investigation of Maine’s law firm, fin, brought them little on the closing path.
They have to live with the knowledge that their alleged Tormentor, Matthew Rutledge, who has also been accused in the report of preparing three other students of the Miss Hall school for sex, will probably never be accused of a crime because the age of consent in Massachusetts is 16.
“When the report came out, I found myself holding so many different emotions at the same time,” said Fares, 33. “I would like the report to have said that here is its youth. But that time has gone and we will never recover it.”
Simon, 38, echoed rates.
“These findings confirm what I already knew about my experienced experience,” he said. “At the same time, I feel a deep sense of validation, something that survivors rarely experience.”
But Fares and Simon’s struggle for justice is not over. In addition to having an open demand against school, women are working to help obtain support for a bill that state legislators have introduced that would allow people as teachers in positions to be criminally responsible, even if the student has reached the age of consent.
In front of a fuss after the rates and Simon they presented themselves in 2024 with the accusations that Rutledge had prepared them for sex when they were adolescent students, the Miss Hall school hired the law firm to investigate the accusations.
The report found that Rutledge was informed to school leadership several times and that the school did not act. It also details other cases of inappropriate sexual behavior that date back to the 1940s against students for other old employees of the venerable boarding school and the daytime school for girls in Pittsfield, where the enrollment is more than $ 75,000 a year for students who address there.
“Miss Hall received information about several separate occasions at the end of the 1990s and mid -2000s about Rutledge’s inappropriate relationships and interactions with students,” says the report. “The evidence supports that school leadership could not investigate and respond properly to the information reported.”
Rutledge, added the report, was a known amount at school. It was a figure of “larger than life” that, on several occasions, served as teacher, coach, resident, advisor and department president, and who was known to shout “to give way to Mr. Wonderful” while “delimited” through the halls, according to the report.
The director of the school, Julie Heaton, issued an apology on behalf of the school and herself after the report was published.
“The investigation revealed horrible truths on a community that we appreciate and caused the personal and institutional calculation,” Heaton wrote.
Heaton, who has been in her position since 2014, admitted that she “did not do enough to protect the well -being of students.”
Fares and Simon said Heaton’s apology was late.
“I do not see the publication of this report how to close the door of my fight,” said Fares, who filed a last civil lawsuit in the Superior Court of Berkshire County against Rutledge, the Miss Hall school, the former director of the Jeannie Norris school and three other women affiliated with school and identified in judicial documents while Jane Doe 1, 2 and 3. That case is still being sought.
“But it was nice to see, in writing that our statements about what happened to us were justified,” Fares said. “I also felt some pride. I’m afraid that if I hadn’t presented, this could still be happening at school.”
Norris, through his lawyer, refused to comment on the civil demand for rates.
Meanwhile, the Miss Hall School Trustee Board issued a statement on the demand for rates.
“Out of respect for former students and survivors involved and to maintain the integrity of the legal process, Miss Hall school will not comment on any pending litigation,” he said.
In March 2024, the rates informed the administration of the school that Rutledge, 63, sexually abused and exploited both when he was a student and after graduating. The school placed Rutledge with administrative license and then resigned. Rutledge taught at school from 1991 to 2024.
Fares also published last April in a private Facebook group for the former student of Miss Hall school who had informed Rutledge to school.
At the same time, the Berkshire District Prosecutor’s Office announced that it would open an investigation into accusations against Rutledge. In October, he concluded that no crime had occurred because the accusers were at least 16 years at the time of incidents.
“Massachusetts’s law defines the age of consent as 16. While the alleged behavior is deeply worrying, it is not illegal,” said District prosecutor Timothy Shugue in a statement.
Now, Simon and the rates have established that the state of Massachusetts approves a law that allows teachers such as Rutledge to process, who has not been accused of a crime despite the accusations that he prepared at least three other Miss Hall school students for sex between 1991 and 2024.
The bills that Simon and rates are supporting, sponsored by state representative Leigh Davis and state senator Joan Lovely, both Democrats, would become a crime for adults into positions of authority or confidence having sexual relations with older adolescents despite the fact that the age of consent of the State is 16 years.
“At this time in Massachusetts, a teacher, a coach or a priest can legally have sex with a 16 or 17 -year -old boy under his care and affirm that he was consensual,” Davis said during a recent hearing before the Joint Committee of the Legislature on the Judiciary. “That is not consent. It is exploitation.”
Simon said she is convinced that Rutledge knew what she was doing when she wait until she was 16 years before the relationship became sexual.
“I started the school when I was 14, he started preparing me when I was 15, and waited until after being 16 years to have sex with me,” Simon said. “I think he had to know that the age of consent in Massachusetts is 16 years old and that he provided coverage. If someone accused him of taking advantage of the students, I think he knew he could use the age of consent as a defense.”
A Rutledge lawyer said: “We have no comment.”
“This will never make sense to me; in spite of the complete control that I had about me, it will not be prosecuted because the age of consent in Massachusetts is 16 years old,” Fares said. “I didn’t say my consent. He stole my virginity and much more.”
Fares said he is aware that modifying the law will not clear a way to “prosecute Matt Rutledge for what he did to us.”
“But, at least, they would protect future students of the same abuse of power,” he said.
