Colorado Springs School District 11 paid nearly $400,000 in legal fees while negotiating settlements with the families of 22 children who say they were molested by a school volunteer.

The money went to Bryan Cave HRO, a Colorado Springs law firm that assisted the district in reaching a $7.1 million settlement in the wake of abuses by then-Colorado Springs Police Officer Joshua Carrier, according to Katherine Ritchie Rapp, the school district’s records supervisor.

The law firm was paid about $369,000 for work on the Carrier case, according to figures she supplied.

The school district said it does not employ attorneys and instead relies on a private law firm “better able” to handle a wide variety of legal issues, including topics in special education and truancy and discipline, as well as issues in personnel and human resources, real estate and election laws.

Ritchie Rapp said the district’s insurance policies covered approximately $5 million of the settlement, with the remaining $2.1 million covered by the district’s general fund contingency reserve.

D-11 released the figures this month at The Gazette’s request, supplying more insight into the costs tied to Carrier, 31, who was convicted in October of molesting 18 of 22 children who accused him of molesting them while he serving as a volunteer at Horace Mann Middle School.

The former officer — once a popular, respected seven-year police veteran — was sentenced last month to 70 years-to-life in prison.

Under state law, sex offenders found guilty of certain offenses can be held beyond their maximum prison term, and up to their natural life, if the Department of Corrections believes they are a threat to public safety.

Guardians of the victims filed civil claims against the school district, the city of Colorado Springs, and several of their employees, claiming they were negligent in their supervision of Carrier, who was found guilty of inappropriately touching student wrestlers while checking them for skin diseases. Some of those checks were video-recorded in secret by Carrier using a laptop that sat open on his office desk.

The officer continued examining the children in the nude even after a parent approached a school administrator with concerns about the checks.

The city of Colorado Springs separately agreed to pay $3.9 million to settle claims — building to a total of just less than $11 million in payouts to children’s families by the school district and city.

The city, with four in-house attorneys assigned to handle litigation matters, did not hire outside counsel, according to an email from city spokeswoman Cindy Aubrey.

Unlike the school district, the city didn’t have insurance and its share of the tab was paid directly from the general fund, Aubrey said.

The legal battle over reports of abuse by Carrier pushed D-11’s overall legal tab for 2012 to $873,000, a 46 percent increase over the previous year’s expenses, $598,000, according to figures it supplied.

Ritchie Rapp said in an email that the district’s legal expenses fluctuate and previously topped $1 million a year during a period in the mid-2000s.

The payouts leave the school district with just more than $1 million remaining in its reserve fund.

There are no immediate plans to replenish the reserve, Ritchie Rapp said, citing state funding reductions for public education.

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Contact Lance Benzel: 636-0366 Twitter @lancebenzel

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