A former admissions officer at an elite New Hampshire prep school who went on to become a Teacher of the Year in Illinois has pleaded not guilty to sexual abuse charges.
Seventy-four-year-old Arthur Peekel faces criminal charges 43 years after alleged abuse. He has been charged with two counts of misdemeanor sexual assault from his time at Phillips Exeter Academy dating back to November and December of 1973.
He's accused of assaulting Lawrence Jenkens when the then-14-year-old visited the school in 1973. NBC5 generally doesn't name people who say they're victims of sexual abuse, but Jenkens wanted to discuss his case publicly.
In an interview with necn, Jenkens said he was visiting the school from North Carolina as a prospective student when he was allegedly molested — charges he and his parents brought to the principal, he said.
"As this was happening to me, all I could think of was, you know, this man is going to kill me," Lawrence Jenkens told necn in a Skype interview.
Jenkens went on to graduate from the school in 1977; Peekel resigned in 1974, a year after the incident allegedly took place. He went on to teach at Rolling Meadows High School in Chicago's northwest suburbs, where he was named Teacher of the Year in 1992.
Officials at Rolling Meadows High School said they were unaware of the Exeter allegations when they hired him and that no allegations had been made against him there. He retired from the school in 2004.
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Police have received multiple allegations of abuse since Phillips Exeter acknowledged a teacher was forced into retirement five years ago over two incidents dating back decades. The school has hired a law firm to investigate.
"We are deeply indebted to the survivors who have stepped forward, and we hope their courage will embolden others to do the same," the school wrote in a letter posted on its website, which administrators directed necn to when asked about Jenkens' allegations. "We are all shocked and angered by the experience described by Mr. Jenkens."
When asked by necn whether he thought the school was at fault, Jenkens replied, "Exeter failed me and it failed itself by not dealing with this in an open way."
Because Peekel left New Hampshire in 1974, the clock on the state's statute of limitations never started.
"That statute does not run during any period of time where the perpetrator, the defendant, is absent from the state," explained attorney Peter Hutchins, who does not represent Jenkens, to necn.
