LEESBURG, Va. (AP) — A lawyer for a school system official accused of perjuring himself during a high-profile investigation of two school-based sexual assaults told jurors Tuesday that her client is “the fall guy” for a series of administrative failings.
The perjury case against Loudoun County Public Schools spokesman Wayde Byard is the first prosecution to go to trial from a special grand jury investigation commissioned by Republican Attorney General Jason Miyares at the request of Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin.
The grand jury examined the school system’s handling of two sexual assaults at two different high schools in 2021. The assaults became a major issue in that year’s gubernatorial election in part because the boy who committed the assaults was allowed to transfer to another school after the first attack and in part because the boy was wearing a skirt when he committed the first attack in a school bathroom. At the time the county was considering a policy change to allow transgender students to use the restroom of their choice.
Byard is well known in the county as the school system’s longtime spokesman, and holds a cult status of sorts among students as the voice that delivers the good news about school closures for snow.
During opening statements Tuesday, defense lawyer Jennifer Leffler said Byard’s fame worked against him in the grand jury investigation, as a politically charged probe looked for someone to blame.
“He’s the face of Loudoun County Public Schools,” she said of Byard. “He’s the fall guy. That’s why we’re here.”
Prosecutor Theo Stamos said the evidence shows Byard lied to the special grand jury when he said he was unaware of the first sexual assault allegation when it occurred at Stone Bridge High School in May 2021. Byard told the grand jury that he only became aware that the allegations involved unwanted sexual contact after the second assault occurred at Broad Run High School in October 2021.
Both sides said there are no emails or documents showing that Byard had been explicitly informed of the alleged assault when it occurred in May. But Stamos said Byard was involved in the school system’s overall response, in which the allegations were discussed. And she said the school principal, Tim Flynn, told him in a phone call about the alleged assault the day it happened.
Flynn was the prosecution’s first witness Tuesday. He said he remembers telling Byard about everything that occurred, including the alleged assault and the chaotic scene afterward, in which he ordered the girl’s dad to be removed from the building after he reacted angrily.
“He needs all the information so he can do his job,” Flynn said of Byard.
On the afternoon of the assault, Byard helped craft a note to Stone Bridge parents that mentioned only the disruption involving the girl’s father and not the sexual assault allegation itself.
On cross-examination, though, Flynn contradicted his earlier testimony on several key aspects of what occurred that day. He gave different responses about whether an online meeting he had with the superintendent occurred in the afternoon or in the evening. And he struggled to explain why he initially described the allegation as an “attempted rape” when the girl was saying that she had, in fact, been raped.
Critics of the school system say Byard and other administrators intentionally obfuscated the facts of the assault because the school board was considering a new policy that would allow transgender students to use the bathroom of their preference, and the attack would support the arguments of opponents who say it’s dangerous for biological boys to use girls’ restrooms.
Others, though, say details of what occurred at Stone Bridge were not at all immediately clear. Police and school administrators were leery of the allegation at first because there was evidence that the boy and girl had met consensually for sex in the girls’ bathroom on previous occasions.
Byard, in his testimony to the special grand jury, said he first understood it as a “boy-girl incident that went sideways,” Leffler said.
The school system’s former superintendent is scheduled to go on trial later this year on charges brought by the special grand jury.
The boy was convicted of both assaults and sentenced last year in juvenile court to attend a locked, residential treatment program until he turns 18.
