Jury acquits former Iowa educator charged after he left child home alone

IOWA CITY — Deliberating less 30 minutes Thursday, a Johnson County jury acquitted a former high school administrator who lost his job after he went drinking with colleagues last year and later passed out or fell asleep with his then 9-year-old daughter at home.

Reggie Shipp, 33, a former dean of students and coach at Southeast Junior High School in Iowa City, faced up to two years in jail for the aggravated misdemeanor of child endangerment.

The charge arose after his daughter was unable to wake him after he came home on June 1, 2022, and called her mother on a Chromebook, triggering a medical check by police and other authorities.

Reached Friday after the verdict, Shipp said he was overjoyed and overwhelmed the case was decided so quickly.

“It’s been over a year that I’ve had this over my head,” he said.

Shipp said he is in the process of filing a complaint with the Iowa Civil Rights Commission over his treatment by Iowa City police, who he believes were biased against him as a Black, single father when deciding whether to pursue a criminal case.

He said he believes he wouldn’t have been charged criminally had he been white or female.

More: Did an Iowa educator's drinking after the last day of school put his daughter at risk?

“I understand that they have a job to do, but I think there were stereotypes involved,” Shipp said. “I felt like they were trying to paint me as an angry Black man.”

The jury entered a sealed verdict without having to return to the courtroom, which is allowed in such misdemeanor cases in Iowa.

County Attorney Rachel Zimmerman Smith said she respected the jury’s decision “based on what they were permitted to hear,” and she believes police and the assistant county attorneys involved did their jobs.

“It was a good question to bring to a jury,” she said.

The case, featured in a Watchdog column in April, drew statewide interest and thousands of readers because of questions it raised about the expectations of parents who have been drinking and when they should be prosecuted for potentially posing harm under Iowa law.

Iowa, like most states, has no law specifying how old a child must be to be left alone at home. To prove child endangerment, prosecutors had to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Shipp knowingly acted in a manner that created "a substantial risk" to his daughter's physical, mental or emotional health or safety.

More: At what age can a child stay home alone in Iowa? Here's what state law says

Long day ends on bathroom floor

Testimony and evidence in the trial showed Shipp had left his daughter home alone several times before the incident that drew police attention and had coached her about what to do — and not do — when he was away.

After a last-day-of-school celebration at Southeast that Shipp attended with his daughter, he took her to their apartment and got her settled in. At around 4:30 p.m, he joined colleagues at BlackStone, a bar and restaurant a little over a mile from his apartment.

Shipp told Watchdog in an interview before the trial he had three Big Grove Easy Eddy beers while messaging and video-chatting with his daughter by a Chromebook tablet she had brought home from school.

Around 7:45 p.m., Dave Cook, an off-duty Iowa City police detective married to a school employee, drove him home.

The daughter, who testified at the trial, called her mother on the Chromebook after she'd found her father on the floor of his bedroom bathroom with dried saliva around his mouth and could not get him up. Later, he did get up and moved to his bed.

Shortly after his ex-wife called 911, three Iowa City police officers arrived, along with the fire department, waking Shipp, who was then sleeping in his bed, to question him.

Police, who never tested Shipp for intoxication the night of the incident, testified he smelled heavily of alcohol, that he was slurring his words and repeating himself. Officer Melanie Long, a new Iowa City police officer who eventually decided to proceed with a criminal case, testified Shipp's demeanor that night was agitated.

At the trial, Assistant County Attorney Susan Nehrig contended Shipp made bad decisions going out that night with colleagues, and that he passed out drunk, creating a substantial risk to his daughter. She noted that when he returned home at around 8 p.m., he didn't check on the girl after putting a pizza in the oven or sit down with her to have dinner.

Instead, he went to his bedroom and closed the door. Nehrig said Shipp forced his daughter, who pulled the pizza out of the oven, to become the adult in the home.

“We’re not asking you to find he’s a bad person,” Nehrig said in her closing arguments. “He may not have planned to put her at risk … but he was in a position to know his actions created that risk.”

During the trial, body camera footage from officers showed Shipp did become agitated after he awoke, he did slur his words and did repeat himself several times when being questioned by police. He also called his daughter a “dumb f---," later saying he was angry at his ex-wife, not the daughter.

Soon after he cussed at the girl, she broke down in tears.

“I was scared,” the girl said, crying to her father. “I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t know what to do.”

Defense attorney Peter Stiefel argued Shipp was exhausted after a long day and acknowledged that while he did drink, he also was potentially dehydrated.

He also said Shipp's daughter was smart, resourceful, had plenty of food and drink in the home, and had an iPad and Chromebook with which to call anyone she needed to.

"For her specifically, being home with him sleeping in his bedroom was not a substantial risk to her," he said.

“If the harm was that (the daughter) was able to become an adult that evening, a majority of the credit would go to her primary caretaker and that is Mr. Shipp,” Stifel said.

For Shipp, a conviction would have had consequences aside from any criminal penalties. He and his ex-wife are awaiting a civil judge’s decision in an argument over primary custody. He also lost his contract with Southeast this year as he awaited trial.

He said he now will begin looking for another job in education.

Lee Rood's Reader's Watchdog column helps Iowans get answers and accountability from public officials, the justice system, businesses and nonprofits. Reach her at lrood@registermedia.com, at 515-284-8549, on Twitter at @leerood or on Facebook at Facebook.com/readerswatchdog.

This article originally appeared on Des Moines Register: Former Iowa educator acquitted of child endangerment charge