Coach’s ‘choke out’ threat becomes first published decision on teacher registry

Parents and the public are finally getting a glimpse into how Manitoba’s teacher misconduct commissioner is handling allegations that land on her desk.

The online teacher registry, for the first time, was updated with details about a recent case involving an Interlake teacher who threatened to “choke out” a student-athlete on a boys volleyball team he was coaching last fall.

Mark Hnatuk served a three-day suspension without pay in February when he returned to Warren Collegiate Institute.

Hnatuk had been on a three-month medical leave in the wake of an incident in a Brandon hotel room that was later reported to both his employer and the teacher misconduct commissioner.

Public documents show Hnatuk got “in very close physical proximity” to a 17-year-old on the evening of Nov. 1 and swore and threatened him.

The Interlake School Division, his longtime employer, issued a formal letter of discipline on Feb. 6.

The division informed him about an immediate and indefinite ban from coaching and ordered him to complete training modules on emotional intelligence and coping with workplace stress.

The Canadian Centre for Child Protection’s Noni Classen called the publication of this case “an important milestone.”

“As these decisions continue to see the light of the day, it will help bring awareness to school personnel, administrators and also external researchers on the nature of the abuses that happen in classrooms (and off-campus) across the province,” Classen said in a statement.

The centre’s director of education noted that analyzing incidents and disciplinary action will help inform intervention strategies to better protect students.

Bobbi Taillefer, a francophone teacher who has spent the last 25 years in union roles, oversaw the Jan. 6 rollout of the provincial registry and its disciplinary process.

Taillefer was announced as the first “commissioner of teacher professional conduct,” an independent contract role, by the Kinew government in 2024.

Premier Wab Kinew enacted Progressive Conservative legislation earlier this year to create a professional regulatory body for teachers.

As a result, caregivers can now look up their children’s teachers in an online database.

Manitoba’s registry lists certificate-holder names, as well as dates of registration, current status and limitations, if any.

Hnatuk’s profile includes a Sept. 23 “consent resolution agreement.”

The first-of-its-kind contract, commonly known as a CRA, has agreed-upon facts about an 11-month-old incident and consequences.

“He has accepted responsibility for his conduct by entering this agreement,” states the five-page document signed by Hnatuk and Taillefer.

Prior to last fall, Hnatuk did not have a disciplinary record in his 20 years with the Interlake School Division.

The agreement indicates an outburst took place when he was coaching during an overnight trip with a boys volleyball team.

The hotel that he, students and parent chaperones were staying at received numerous noise complaints about the group.

When a Grade 12 girl on the trip told the teacher she felt threatened by a 17-year-old athlete who had told her to “shut the f—- up,” the on-duty coach intervened.

He entered the player’s hotel room and yelled at the teenage boy, something along the lines of “If you ever tell Student (X) to shut the f—- up, I will choke you out.”

(The document does not make clear why a teenage girl was on the Brandon trip or the nature of her relationship with Hnatuk.)

Hnatuk’s doctor submitted a report that suggested circumstances related to his physical health and mental health, including two recent deaths in his immediate family, resulted in an “out of character” response.

“CRAs are an opportunity to support learning, to support people when they’ve had lapses of judgment, to step back and… take that pause,” Taillefer said Monday.

The commissioner touted the new system’s “greater transparency” compared to its predecessor.

Prior to Jan. 6, complaints were dealt with behind closed doors at the employer and union levels. Education ministers were only involved in serious cases. Historically, little to no information about outcomes was made public.

Changes introduced in 2023 by former teacher Wayne Ewasko, now the PC education critic, sought to make investigations more independent and disciplinary records widely known.

Taillefer said releasing consent resolution agreements — examples of misconduct and disciplinary action — should dissuade others from making the same mistakes.

Case studies can be used by university professors to bolster student-teacher training and equip future professionals for the unique dynamics of kindergarten-to-Grade 12 workplaces, the commissioner noted.

The Free Press reached out to the Interlake School Division for comment about the delay in disclosing this incident to Taillefer.

Taillefer began accepting complaints on Jan. 6. Interlake flagged the incident to her on Feb. 10. An independent investigation wasn’t ordered until April 16.

The commissioner said her office has received numerous reports and must triage them based on the severity of allegations.

Interlake superintendent Margaret Ward declined to comment on the public case, citing it as “a personnel matter.”

This story was originally published in The Free Press. It is republished under a Creative Commons license as part of the Local Journalism Initiative.