May 3, 2001 | 4:00am
A Bronx elementary-school teacher who says he has HIV was charged yesterday with sodomizing a 9-year-old student in what a cop called one of the most horrifying child-sex cases he’s ever investigated.
Milton McFarlane, 38, a Poughkeepsie resident who teaches at PS 78 in the Bronx’s Williamsbridge section, was also accused of repeatedly sexually abusing a second boy, an 8-year-old. Both youngsters were attacked in school, cops said.
McFarlane was investigated previously for sexual conduct with students, and may have attacked others, authorities said.
“You expect our teachers to ensure the safety of our children,” said a detective on the case. “This is one of the worst cases I’ve heard of.”
McFarlane continued teaching despite allegations in 1998 that he exposed himself to one student and unzipped the pants of another, Schools Chancellor Harold Levy said last night.
Officials dropped the case because conflicting student stories made the charges unprovable, Levy said.
Asked why McFarlane wasn’t transferred to an administrative job after the investigation, Levy spokeswoman Karen Finnerty said:
“Certainly, on the surface, it raises very serious questions about judgment. That is why the chancellor will refer this for investigation.”
Levy said McFarlane will be fired.
The teacher is accused of asking the 9-year-old to stay after school Tuesday under the guise that the youngster needed extra help.
When the two were alone in the classroom, police said, McFarlane looked at pornography with the boy on classroom computers.
McFarlane touched the boy and eventually sodomized him, said cops, whose account of what happened in the classroom is mostly based on the boy’s statement.
When the boy got home at about 3:30 p.m., his mother asked why he was late – and the boy told her what the teacher allegedly did.
After a police interview, the boy was taken to Montefiore Hospital, where a doctor confirmed that he had been assaulted, cops said.
The boy seemed nonplused by the incident, cops said – but his mother’s emotions ran the gamut, from amazement to anger to concern for her child.
The 9-year-old gave detectives the name of the 8-year-old victim.
That boy said he’d been touched four times, police said.
When the principal at PS 78 heard about the case Tuesday night, he transferred McFarlane to an administrative job at another school, which police didn’t name.
McFarlane was busted yesterday at his new school, said Lt. Dennis Organ of the Bronx Special Victims Squad.
During questioning, McFarlane said he needed medication. When officers asked what kind, he answered: “I’ve got HIV.”
School officials said they hadn’t known about McFarlane’s illness.
McFarlane has been a city teacher for seven years, the Board of Education says. He worked four years as a substitute before being hired permanently in 1998.
“I had him for science four years ago,” said Loreal Johnson, a PS 78 student. “He seemed to be OK.”
But Johnson added that students often spoke of McFarlane by using a slur denoting homosexuality.