A former school psychologist in the Cornell School District has filed a lawsuit against the district and its superintendent, claiming sexual harassment.

Kimberly Santez, who worked at the district from 2002 until she was fired in February, claims that Superintendent Erwin Weischedel touched her repeatedly, leered at her and made inappropriate comments, including that he had a "wild imagination" about her.

In her lawsuit, filed Aug. 30, Ms. Santez said that she was fired after she formally complained about the harassment to school district officials.

She is seeking both compensatory and punitive damages.

Mr. Weischedel declined to comment on the suit.

The 18-page complaint includes a litany of allegations against the superintendent, who began working as a principal in the Cornell School District in August 2002 after leaving a position of assistant superintendent at North Allegheny School District.

Mr. Weischedel became superintendent at Cornell in 2006.

According to the lawsuit, Ms. Santez said that it was at that point that Mr. Weischedel "suddenly and noticeably" went out of his way to interact with and flirt with her.

In October 2006, she claims that he attended a meeting at which he was not required, sat down next to her, reached under the table and squeezed and patted her knee.

After that, Ms. Santez said she made a concerted effort to avoid Mr. Weischedel. But when she did, the lawsuit continues, there was an abrupt reduction in her work assignments.

Later, Mr. Weischedel requested that she be in contact with him, and when she complied, she received more work, she said.

It was also at that point, though, that Ms. Santez noticed Mr. Weischedel following her around the school.

The lawsuit claims that Mr. Weischedel approached her from behind and massaged her shoulders; once stroked her back continuously as she walked down the hallway, while holding her 3-year-old daughter; and once pretended to bite her finger when she was pointing at something.

In another instance, Ms. Santez claims that while she was on a treadmill in the school fitness center, Mr. Weischedel began talking to her, and though there was no one else in the room and a lot of open floor space, he lay down on the floor directly behind her to do abdominal crunches.

He continued to speak with her from that position, the lawsuit said, and "admitted that he had been staring at the area of Ms. Santez's buttocks some weeks earlier when she bent over, [and] that he noticed a distinct identifying mark on Ms. Santez's body when her shirt came untucked."

The lawsuit contends that there was a "pervasive atmosphere of condoned sexual harassment," in the district, and that Mr. Weischedel engaged in the same behavior with other employees, including one teacher who resigned after he grabbed her buttocks.

In addition, it says that students have complained that Mr. Weischedel makes them very uncomfortable because he is "always touching them."