Joliet West Teacher Got 4 Months Pay To Stay Away From School

JOLIET, IL — The upper administration for Joliet Township High School District 204 gave arrested Joliet West math teacher Ashlee Catalani four-and-a-half months of paid leave in exchange for her resignation at the end of the 2019-2020 school year, Joliet Patch has learned.

Patch obtained details of the financial settlement as part of a recent Freedom of Information Act request to District 204 regarding Catalani's employment.

According to the financial arrangement, Catalani, now 34, had been a tenured teacher. She taught math in her regular Joliet West classroom from Aug. 15, 2019 until Jan. 14, 2020, making $38,566 during that period.

Catalani was in the Will County Jail on Jan. 9, 2020. She subsequently posted 10 percent of her $15,000 bail to regain her freedom while awaiting trial.

Catalani had been charged in connection with the violent beating of her ex-boyfriend in January 2020. She eventually pleaded guilty to criminal trespass to a residence in exchange for four other charges being dropped. Her co-defendant still faces charges in the incident including battery causing bodily harm.

From Jan. 15, 2020 through May 29, 2020, Catalani received $36,889 in paid leave from District 204, the documents obtained through Joliet Patch's FOIA show.

Emails between assistant superintendent for business services Ilandus Hampton and a pair of teacher's union representatives reflect that an agreement to part ways with Catalani was in the works shortly after word of her arrest made the news.

According to the emails, Catalani would receive more than four months of pay for staying away from Joliet West in exchange for submitting her immediate resignation notice. The resignation would take effect at the end of the 2019-2020 school year, which was around Memorial Day.

On Jan. 29, 2020, Hampton included the following information in his email exchange with the two teachers union representatives.

"Good Afternoon, Attached is a Resignation Agreement that places Ms. Catalani on paid administrative leave for the remainder of the 2019-20 school term in exchange for her resignation. We need a signed copy (last two pages) returned so it can be recommended the Board for approval," Hampton wrote.

The document was presented for approval to the Joliet Township School Board the next day, Jan. 30, 2020.

"In consideration for her resignation and release of claims, the BOARD agrees to place CATALANI on paid administrative leave through the end of the 2019-2020 school term and provide her the remainder of salary and benefits per the teachers' collective bargaining agreement in the same manner as if she were actively working during this time," the document read.

In total, Catalani made $75,455 during the 2019-2020 school year, of which, almost half of her compensation came from her paid leave, following her arrest and incarceration.

Earlier this month, Joliet Patch reported that Catalani's lawyer, Chuck Bretz, worked out a plea bargain with the Will County State's Attorney's Office for his client. Under the terms, four of the five charges were dropped against Catalani back in September.

Catalani received two years of conditional discharge from Will County's judiciary and $544 in fines. On Dec. 18, a Will County judge determined that Catalani is complying with the terms of her conditional discharge, court records show.

Bretz told Joliet Patch's editor that Catalani was not responsible for the attack involving her ex-boyfriend, and that it was her co-defendant, Ponciano Vargas, a 42-year-old Crest Hill man.

"Ashlee is a good girl," Bretz remarked earlier this month. "She, at the end of the day, did not intend for anything inappropriate to happen. And the codefendant finds a girl he happens to be seeing ... he's the one who became violent."

Catalani is at least the second known District 204 school official who received a significant payout in exchange for agreeing to resign in the middle of the 2019-2020 school year.

Last February, the District 204 School Board agreed to pay first-year Superintendent Mike Hanson at least $87,500 in exchange for staying off the job for the next five months.

Hanson, who came from South Dakota, was hired to replace retiring District 204 Superintendent Cheryl McCarthy. But halfway into Hanson's first year on the job in Joliet, the District 204 School Board decided to get rid of him and make assistant superintendent Karla Guseman the new permanent superintendent instead.

"Dr. Hanson will receive the value of the first year of his contract until June 30 but not the remaining two years," a statement from the school board president noted last Feb. 11.

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