A Jewish school administrator claims in a federal lawsuit that he was “tormented” by his principal who considered him “on the wrong side of God.”
David Possner, an assistant principal at MS 226 in South Ozone Park, Queens, claims in the Manhattan suit that colleagues texted him about a work assignment during Yom Kippur.
Because he used his phone to read the text and reply — which goes against Orthodox custom on High Holy Days — they called him a “bad Jew.”
When he alerted Principal Rushell White, a Christian, to the harassment, she allegedly replied, “Maybe you are a bad Jew,” according to court papers.
White also allegedly “callously targeted” Possner, who is demanding a transfer out of the school.
She once ordered him to pick up a half-eaten plum off the floor in view of school custodians, who then teased him and texted that he should “pick up fruit stuck in their butts,” according to court papers.
When a student set off third-floor fire extinguishers during the 2012-13 school year, White accused Possner, although he’d been supervising kids on the first floor, he charges.
White said she had “one Jew too many” in the school, Possner claims.
The Department of Education declined to comment.