Lissette Quiñones
Anchor Contributor
After a somewhat quiet summer in North Kingstown, the pot has begun to stir again after news reports came out on Sept. 9 that Aaron Thomas, a former member of the North Kingstown school department, has “asked” judges to “toss charges in naked fat-test cases.”
As a reminder, Thomas was not only the communications teacher for the North Kingstown high school, but also head coach of the boys basketball team, leading them to win the 2019 state championship. There was, however, an unfortunate catch for many players involved.
Allegations were made back in 2018 that Thomas required male athletes to perform “body fat tests,” making these students meet in a secret location on school property and strip down completely naked. The allegations go on to say that Thomas would then proceed to invade the genital areas of the athletes, sometimes even pinching the skin, to “measure the fat.”
Many other students came forward when the school department failed by not investigating further into the allegations. This left the department with no choice but to suspend Thomas, along with many other staff members who did not take the allegations as seriously as they should have.
Thomas was arraigned back in August, yet plead not guilty. Picking back up as of last Friday, Thomas is attempting to get both his charges, one count of second-degree sexual assault and one count of second-degree sexual molestation, dropped by the judge. His attorney, John MacDonald filed the motion Thursday.
These charges only came from two cases: one student who was victimized between the years 2000 and 2002, and another student who was victimized between 2019 and 2020.
For more descriptive detail on this case, please refer to the two articles linked below from March 2021 and November 2021. These articles from The Anchor provide more information on some of the gruesome details involving this particular case that has yet to be settled. Article number one, and article number two. Additional information can be found on WPRI’s website here: https://www.wpri.com/?submit=&s=Aaron+thomas&orderby=relevance.
The Anchor will continue to provide updates on this case.