Former Kentucky Middle School Teacher Sentenced in Student Abuse Case; School Complaint Lawsuit Settled for $100,000

Court documents describe concerns about Bath County Middle School teacher Darvin Andy Crouch spending considerable time with a seventh-grade female student who was then 13. A student told a school counselor she was concerned about how close the relationship had become. Family members later found a note the student had written to Crouch, approached the school, and asked for an investigation. According to court documents filed in U.S. District Court in Eastern Kentucky, administrators told the girl’s family it was a “school girl crush.”

The family then asked whether the girl could be moved to a different social studies teacher. School officials said there was no other social studies teacher for her grade. Federal court documents allege that no investigation by school officials was completed. The girl was moved to a conference room to complete coursework from a workbook, a change the lawsuit says left her humiliated and embarrassed as she sat alone in the hallway while Crouch continued teaching inside the classroom. “They never did anything,” the victim said. “They heard about it multiple times. They need to listen to students.” The lapse in response is a lesson in protecting the vulnerable (Proverbs 31:8-9).

Criminal and civil court documents state that the girl and Crouch were meeting secretly and were in a physical relationship. A family member recorded conversations between the girl and Crouch in a car, in which Crouch reportedly said he wanted to be with the girl when she turned 18. The family gave the recording to Kentucky State Police. According to the criminal and civil records, Crouch was charged with eight counts of first-degree sexual abuse, two counts of third-degree sodomy and two counts of third-degree rape. Court records show he was sentenced in 2017 to five years in prison after pleading guilty to multiple counts of first-degree sexual abuse.

A civil lawsuit alleging that Bath County school officials failed to protect the girl was settled in September 2021 for $100,000, according to court documents. Crouch did not return calls or a letter from his lawyers asking for comment. Multiple calls to Bath County school attorneys and the district’s current superintendent were not returned.

A Herald-Leader review of 194 teachers whose licenses were voluntarily surrendered, suspended or revoked by the Kentucky Education Professional Standards Board from 2016 to 2021 found that 61% of cases traced back to sexual misconduct. The newspaper said Crouch’s case was unusual because he was one of the few accused teachers who spent more than a year in prison. Its review of the criminal prosecutions of 118 teachers who lost or had their licenses suspended for sexual misconduct found that few served more than a year in jail. The Herald-Leader examined thousands of pages of license revocation documents and interviewed dozens of people over 12 months.

Kentucky Education Commissioner Jason Glass said more can be done to root out and stop sexual misconduct involving teachers. He noted, however, that the number of teachers disciplined for such misconduct is small compared with the number overseen by the board, which counted 42,525 certified teachers in Kentucky in the 2020-2021 school year. “I do think it is important to note that it is a small percentage of educators who have cases brought before the Kentucky Education Professional Standards Board,” Glass said. “Of those cases, it is a small percentage that involve sexual misconduct with a student.”

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