Ted Curry: St. Ignatius Lawsuit, Devine Allegations, Trial Date

Ted Curry’s lawsuit against St. Ignatius College Preparatory is a wrongful termination and whistleblower retaliation case filed May 29, 2025, in San Francisco County Superior Court, in which the longtime drama teacher seeks more than $10.5 million from the Jesuit high school and its principal, Michelle Levine, alleging he was fired in February 2025 for cooperating with an investigation into sexual misconduct by a former drama director.¹²

The case is captioned Edward Curry vs. The Ignatian Corporation et al. The Ignatian Corporation operates St. Ignatius College Preparatory in San Francisco.²

What Curry Says Happened

The retaliation claim traces back to an April 2022 report. An alumnus told Principal Levine that Peter Devine, then the school’s drama director, had kissed him in 1996. The school placed Devine on administrative leave and hired the outside law firm Villegas Carrera to investigate. That investigation found Devine “not credible” and concluded a preponderance of the evidence supported a finding that he had engaged in unwelcome sexual advances.¹³

Curry cooperated. He told the investigators that in 2006 he had reported Devine’s behavior to school administration after Devine, Curry said, trapped a male student against a wall backstage. According to Curry, the school took no action at the time and never followed up with him.⁴⁵

After those disclosures, Curry alleges, the school’s treatment of him shifted. The complaint says he was excluded from meetings and that an assistant was hired without his input. In August 2023, according to the lawsuit, Levine sent him a text summoning him to the school president’s office after he was overheard discussing school news with colleagues. In October 2024, the school issued him a written warning for “unprofessional and unacceptable conduct” after he questioned his work expectations. He was fired on February 11, 2025.⁴¹

Curry has framed the firing in moral terms. “I did the right thing. I didn’t keep it quiet,” he said. He also told SFGATE: “My mornings are still melancholy. Who am I now?”⁵

What the School Says

St. Ignatius has pointed to Curry’s performance. His termination letter, the school stated, cited “a continued pattern of unsatisfactory and unacceptable performance and not meeting the expectations of your position,” specifically referring to his absence from mandatory school events. Curry has countered that those absences were due to illness and to chaperoning duties for other school functions.¹

Jim Bettencourt, the school’s director of human resources, declined to comment on the pending litigation but told reporters that “we take all accusations of misconduct seriously and we investigate them fully.” Spokesperson Thomas Murphy also declined to comment.⁴ The defendants filed their answer to Curry’s First Amended Complaint on September 19, 2025.²

The Devine Allegations in the Background

Curry’s retaliation claim is tied to a larger set of abuse allegations at the school. A separate 2023 lawsuit brought by the former student who said Devine abused him in 1996 was set for trial in September 2025, and Curry was expected to testify.⁴

Curry’s account of the 2006 backstage incident was corroborated to NBC Bay Area by Sara Phillips-Ritchey, a former theater department staff member who said she witnessed Devine pin a student against a wall and that her supervisor reported it to the school at the time. A separate outside firm’s report noted that in 2020 a former teacher received information that three alumni from different graduating classes alleged Devine had assaulted them. Tim Hale, the attorney for the alumnus plaintiff, has alleged that the school failed to report multiple prior incidents to law enforcement.³ A 2023 SFGATE report said more than a dozen men associated with St. Ignatius have been accused of sexual abuse over the years, and the 2023 lawsuit alleged the school fostered a culture of “secrecy and abuse” for decades.⁶

Devine stayed on the St. Ignatius faculty until he retired in 2022.⁶

Case Status and Trial Date

The lawsuit is pending before Judge Rochelle East in San Francisco County Superior Court. Curry filed a First Amended Complaint on August 14, 2025, and the defendants answered the following month. A jury trial is scheduled for September 28, 2026.²

Who Ted Curry Is

Curry graduated from St. Ignatius in 1982 and returned as a teacher around 2000, spending nearly 25 years there as a drama director and fine arts teacher. His productions at the school included All My Sons, Pippin, and Mame.⁴⁷ His legal name on the court docket is Edward Curry.²

1
San Francisco Chronicle. St. Ignatius School Teacher Lawsuit Termination
2
UniCourt. Edward Curry vs. The Ignatian Corporation et al
3
NBC Bay Area. St. Ignatius Abuse Drama Director Lawsuit
4
SFGATE. Lawsuit: Ex-SF Private School Teacher Alleges Retaliation
5
OnStage Blog. Drama Teacher Claims He Was Fired for Reporting Abuse
6
SFGATE. Sexual Abuse Allegations at St. Ignatius
7
St. Ignatius College Preparatory. SI Magazine, Winter 2019