Ex-paraprofessional in Poudre sentenced for abusing children, some with disabilities
DENVER (KDVR) — A former paraprofessional in the Poudre School District received the maximum sentence after pleading guilty on Jan. 29 to several assault, child abuse and harassment charges.
Tyler Zanella, 37, was originally faced 164 charges.
In January, he pleaded guilty to seven counts of third-degree assault on an at-risk person, two counts of harassment and two counts of child abuse – knowingly/recklessly causing bodily injury. These were the top charges for each of his victims in this case, according to the 8th Judicial District Attorney’s Office.
On Thursday, a judge sentenced Zanella to 12.5 years of confinement, with 10.5 years in the Department of Corrections following two years in the Larimer County Jail.
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The charges stem from his actions while working as a paraprofessional at the Poudre School District. In May 2023, Zanella was accused of hitting a kindergarten student with disabilities on his bus route. Law enforcement began to investigate and found evidence this had happened several times before with the same child, and then found 10 more children who had been abused.
Videos of the abuse were captured on bus surveillance systems.
“This was a 36-year-old man abusing children from ages 5-10,” said Laura Hinojos, the 8th Judicial District Attorney’s Office Special Victims Unit chief prosecutor. “He believes that he did not cause any long-term effects to these children, and much like most things he says — this is a lie.”
At the Thursday sentencing, 12 people provided statements about the effect of Zanella’s abuse on the children, their families and the community.
“I have no idea who needs to hear this, and I have no idea if they are in this room or not, but you don’t hire someone with a conviction of child abuse to be a paraprofessional to work with kids,” Judge Daniel McDonald said before his ruling, according to the DA’s office. He also detailed the abuse he witnessed Zanella commit on each of these children through provided evidence.
“I believe that the only option is to remove Mr. Zanella from the community for as long as I can,” McDonald said.
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According to Colorado court records, Zanella also was sentenced on one charge of child abuse – negligence that caused no injury in February 2013 for an incident in January 2012. He was sentenced to 18 months probation and required to pay court costs after he pleaded guilty to the single charge through a plea deal. Because of the deal, another child abuse charge was dismissed by the district attorney.
Affected families react to sentence length
After the sentencing, the parent of a child abused by Zanella told FOX31 the judge “did the best he could to his legal abilities to give him the full sentence.”
“But for all of us as parents, I’m sure that 12 and a half years is not going to be enough,” she said. “By the time he gets out of prison, our kids will all be young adults. Hopefully, by then they will all be moved on from this situation.”
Sabrina Herrick, another parent whose child was affected, said she has sought action from the area’s representatives to increase the legal penalties for these kinds of crimes. She also said Zanella would not be serving enough time and said the DA should not have given him the plea deal.
“I’m not terribly surprised,” she said. “I mean, I was holding out some hope that the deal would fall through, I maintain that I don’t like the (plea) deal. I don’t think it’s a long enough sentence, especially when you consider that the DA warned us before this hearing that whatever sentence he got, he’d probably only serve half of it. Especially when you consider that, I don’t think the 12 and half years is enough.”
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After information about Zanella’s actions came to light, Poudre School District implemented new training for bus drivers and paraprofessionals. The district spokesperson, Madeline Noblett, said in August 2023 that the district was making changes.
“All of our bus drivers and paraprofessionals are going through a whole host of training that we believe will be able to help them better support every student on every bus as an individual,” Noblett said.
Supervisors were also tasked with reviewing school bus surveillance every week.
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