Posted on 04/11/2008 12:48:24 PM PDT by Snickering Hound
At least eight ads in the Yellow Pages that hawk exotic entertainment by female companions lead callers to numbers belonging to a teacher at Kellam High School in Virginia Beach.
The numbers used to reach Penthouse V.I.P. , Exotic Playmates, Exotic Sinsations, Fantasies, Sweet Pleasures, Party Girls, Oasis Escorts and Delilah’s are all registered in the name of Michelle Droelle, a 33-year-old social studies teacher in her first year in the classroom at Kellam. The ads appear in the 2007 edition of the Verizon Yellow Pages.
Standing outside her Ocean Lakes home after school Tuesday afternoon, Droelle insisted she left the escort business two years ago before she started teaching but neglected to take the phone lines out of her name.
“I didn’t want to do both things at the same time,” Droelle said. “I wanted to be a teacher.”
According to Virginia Beach business license records, Droelle owned Penthouse V.I.P. until August 2006 and ran similar businesses with a variety of names. Droelle said she sold the operation to her former neighbor and partner, Robin Lupton. Lupton registered Penthouse V.I.P. in her name in September 2007.
Lupton said she and Droelle were in business together “for years.” Droelle, she said, is no longer involved with the companies but does continue to write checks for the phone lines. “I give her the cash to cover it,” Lupton said.
School Board chairman Dan Edwards said he might not object to a teacher being connected with an escort service “as long as they had an absolute firewall between their duties as a teacher and this other sideline,” he said.
“At least on the surface, an escort service is only that. I’m not an expert.”
Calls to phone numbers linked to Droelle reach an operator who refers callers to a Web site that features photos of a dozen young women in provocative poses and various states of undress. The operator explains that for $100 cash, one of the “girls” will meet the caller at the location of his choosing and stay for one hour, during which she will strip naked, perform a lap dance and floor show, and provide companionship.
Such acts are legal in Virginia, as long as they take place in private and everyone involved is at least 18.
“What I did before is my personal business,” Droelle said. “I’ve never broken any laws.”
But School Board member Todd Davidson, who is a pastor, said teachers and members of clergy are held to a higher standard. “We have a responsibility to be role models and to be, as best we can, upstanding citizens,” he said.
The school division’s human resources department would not say whether an affiliation with an escort service would be automatic grounds for discipline or termination. In a statement, the department said that any “complaint or allegation of misconduct by an employee would be considered in accordance with established School Board policies.”
It’s not clear whether Droelle violated any policies. Virginia state code says teachers may be disciplined for “immorality” but does not define the term.
School Board member Em Davis, a former school administrator, saw it this way: “What she does on her own time is supposed to be her own business, but it does bother me.”
It bothers Judy Thieman, too. Her daughter takes one of Droelle’s classes. “It’s just not the appropriate type of business background you would want – teaching your kids and spending the day with your kids,” Thieman said. “What kind of influence is that?”
Droelle, visibly upset when speaking outside her home Tuesday, said she recently earned her bachelor’s degree. “I used to dance,” she said. “I put myself through college.”
Droelle said she began teaching last school year at Open Campus High School in Virginia Beach, where older high school students and adults can take flexible courses toward a high school diploma or GED. She accepted a $38,000 teaching position at Kellam in the fall.
Now she expects a backlash could end her teaching career.
“The best thing I can do right now is call and resign my job,” she said.
As of Tuesday evening, the school division said Droelle was still employed.
Dominic Melito, another social studies teacher at Kellam, said he was surprised to hear Droelle could be involved with an escort service. “I find that extremely hard to believe. You wouldn’t think any of this could possibly be true.”
Not guilty because properly made up and dressed she could be a knockout
Guilty!
I graduated from Floyd E. Kellam High School in (blank). They are about to tear it down since it has been standing since , what, 1955. We never had scandals like that when I went there.
No wonder she went into teaching. She will make more money.
Ugh.
ya gotta be kidding me
1955!! That ain't so long!! LOL.I went for only 1 year in the mid 70's then my family moved back to NJ. When I graduated college I moved back and have been here ever since. Heck...I live less than a mile and a half from Kellam now.
I attended in ‘72 and ‘73.
I attended in ‘72 and ‘73.
I attended in ‘72 and ‘73.
Wow, it is a small world, Tidewater Freepers!
How come all of my female high school teachers were no more alluring than the lunch ladies?
That just about says it all. For all of you who might have children in the public schools...why on earth would you EVER entrust your children to these people?
Her explanation (yesterday)? Her name was just still on the phone bills, but she had already divorced herself from the business BEFORE she ever started teaching. End of story, right? Wrong? Someone looked into this a little more closely and found out that Ms. Droelle was actually still very much involved in the escort business and so she’s been forced to resign.
As of Tuesday, Droelle still managed the businesses on a day-to-day basis, according to several women who said they have worked recently for the escort service.
One dancer, who appears on the Web site of Penthouse V.I.P. but requested that her name not be used in this article, said she has worked for Droelle for more than a year. She said that once Droelle took the teaching job at Kellam, she tried to keep a lower profile in the company – avoiding the weekly meetings where the dancers settle up their accounts with the service and collect their paychecks, signed by Droelle.
“Michelle didn’t want the newer girls to see her so she stopped coming to the meetings for a while,” the woman said. “But then she started coming again. I saw her at one in the past month.”
One day earlier, Michelle Droelle told The Virginian-Pilot she got out of the business before she began teaching two years ago. But The Pilot has discovered escort service ad contracts signed by Droelle during the current school year – including one dated March 12, 2008.
Droelle, 33, voluntarily resigned, school officials said.
The contracts for phone book ads list Droelle as the owner of Penthouse V.I.P. and her home address in Ocean Lakes as the company’s location.
Penthouse V.I.P. is the umbrella for an operation that runs ads under at least 20 different names, such as Exotic Playmates, Sinful Seductions and Party Girls.
Droelle did not return calls Wednesday to her home or business. Her lawyer, Mike Joynes, said that “pursuant to an agreement with the School Board, Michelle can’t have any comment.”
However, the school division denies requiring her silence.
“She chose to resign,” spokeswoman Eileen Cox said. “We don’t have any conditions on her resignation.”
ouch! ;)
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