A campus supervisor at an Encinitas middle school was arrested this week on suspicion of molesting a 12-year-old child, sheriff’s officials said Tuesday.
Omar Hernandez Galeana, a campus supervisor at Diegueño Middle School, was arrested Sunday on suspicion of child molestation and furnishing marijuana to a minor, sheriff’s Lt. Lon Nguyen said.
Galeana, 21, remained jailed Tuesday in lieu of $1 million bail. He is expected to be arraigned Wednesday in Vista Superior Court.
The alleged incident happened outside school hours Friday, Nguyen said. He did not provide further information about what happened.
He said deputies with the North Coastal Station and the Child Abuse Unit immediately began investigating when the report came in to law enforcement. He did not say when the report was made.
On the day of Galeana’s arrest, sheriff’s officials notified San Dieguito Unified High School District, which the middle school is a part of. On Monday, Superintendent Anne Staffieri notified families about the arrest, saying she had “some deeply concerning news to share.”
In a letter, Staffieri said Galeana had been arrested “on allegations of inappropriate off-campus behavior involving minors under the age of 14.”
Citing the ongoing investigation, she said the district is “extremely limited in terms of the information we can share about the former employee and the allegations.”
Galeana had worked at the middle school campus in Encinitas’ Olivenhain community for three months. “As of today, he is no longer an employee of the District,” the superintendent wrote.
Staffieri said people should not discuss the “terribly unfortunate situation” on social media “as that will not help law enforcement with their investigation, and it serves only to compromise the privacy of those involved.”
The case marks the third arrest within a week of a school staffer accused of sex crimes involving juveniles.
Last Thursday, two San Diego-area educators were arrested in unrelated cases — a Mt. Carmel High School drama teacher accused of sexually abusing a student, and a Hoover High School assistant principal accused of soliciting child sexual abuse material from a minor.
The drama teacher pleaded not guilty. The assistant principal is expected to be arraigned later this week.
