Teacher Put on Leave After Dressing as Devil, Saying 'Hail Satan'

An Arizona High School teacher has been put on paid administrative leave after students alleged that he dressed as the devil and said "hail Satan' to the class, as reported by 12News.

Nathaniel Hamlet, a student at Mesa High School, said that the incident occurred on Oct. 25. The student claimed that the teacher wore devil horns and held a pitchfork, and as students entered the class, he waved it over their heads and said, "Hail Satan."

"Some people thought it was funny, some people didn't like it, some people were like 'whatever,' they just blew it off," Hamlet recalled. "I said, 'Don't do that to me' and I pushed [the pitchfork] away, maybe three or four times and he still said it and still did it."

Hamlet informed his father, Chris Hamlet, of the teacher's behavior. Chris Hamlet is a former Mesa Public School board candidate, and he and his son are both Christian. Thus, Chris reported the teacher to the school principal.

“What really tipped it over for me is, he kept telling him no, and he and the teacher kept persisting," the father asserted.

When Nathaniel Hamlet returned to school the following day, the teacher wasn't there, and he became aware that the teacher was put on administrative leave and was being investigated by the school's Human Resources department. The teen argued that because the teacher repeated the act over and over to all of the students, he should be fired.

"If you're gonna keep the Christian stuff out, then you got to keep the devil-worshiping stuff out, period,” his father added.

The teacher defended his actions, arguing that the costume and behavior was simply an act in celebration of the school's Halloween spirit week.

"Participating in spirit weeks like this is a way for me to engage with my students and bring fun to my classroom," they wrote. "It's truly not any more complicated than that."

Chris Hamlet has since written a lengthy Facebook post voicing his frustrations with the teacher.

"HAIL SATAN IN MESA PUBLIC SCHOOLS, ARE YOU KIDDING ME?? Mesa Public Schools is hypersexualizing, indoctrinating, and grooming our children at every turn!!" he wrote. "This teacher also had an inappropriate conversation with my son and another student a few weeks back and called my son homophobic, because this teacher, is in fact, a homosexual."

"This is only one of handfuls and handfuls of examples that I have all over the course of the past four years. I have a 3 to 4 inch-thick file that has tons of evidence of indoctrination, hypersexualization, and grooming coming from Mesa Public Schools."

See the news report and read Chris Hamlet's full post below.