In 1981, the father of a 9-year-old boy in Leonia, New Jersey, came forward to accuse the boy’s fourth-grade teacher of molesting him on three occasions. Two more boys, a pair of brothers, would follow with similar allegations soon after.

“Mr. A,” John Anagnosti, resigned from the Leonia School District in April 1981 and initially pleaded guilty to the molestation charges. 

And then the Leonia community spoke out — in favor of Mr. A. 

Parents, neighbors, and the mayor of Leonia himself held benefit dinners and fundraisers for the 14-year-teacher they saw as “the greatest.” Community members raised $10,000 for Mr. A’s defense. The outpouring of the community was so strong that it made national headlines and garnered infamy in the pages of a pro-pedophilia international magazine. 

By the time Anagnosti was convicted in court a year later, that narrative — in which Anagnosti was the real victim — had become so pervasive that the judge sentenced Mr. A to probation, therapy, and a $25 fine. 

Leonia: 44 Years Later

That sentence, and Leonia’s aggressive rally in support of Mr. A, have profoundly marked the lives of those boys, and the ones who spoke out later, after escaping their hometown. Some of those boys, now men, have come together to seek justice and, most importantly, healing.