By BEN DOBBIN
Associated Press

ROCHESTER - A substitute teacher imprisoned in the 1970s for contributing to a Long Island toddler's death by hitting her with karate blows ended up teaching again in rural Western New York over the last decade.

The state Education Department said Friday that Harold Eisenman was cleared in 2004 to work as a substitute teacher at the Gowanda school district south of Buffalo after he falsely claimed that his manslaughter conviction stemmed from a reckless-driving accident.

The department is consulting with law-enforcement officials and considering possible legal action, spokesman Jonathan Burman said.

Eisenman, who is now 60, was convicted of second-degree manslaughter and spent six years in prison for contributing to the death of 2-year-old Diane Salica at her family's home in Island Park on Nov. 30, 1973. Fern Salica, the child's mother and Eisenman's girlfriend, spent nearly four years in prison for criminally negligent homicide.

Eisenman, a substitute gym teacher at the time, told police he used the child as a subject in a karate demonstration for Salica's two older children, Denise, 8, and John Jr., 5. Diane died the next day from internal injuries, including a ruptured spleen.

The non-jury conviction was upheld in 1976 by the Court of Appeals, the state's highest court.

Eisenman does not appear to have a telephone listing and efforts to reach him were unsuccessful.

Gowanda's school superintendent, Charles Rinaldi, said Eisenman was frequently used as substitute, mainly in the middle and high schools, starting in April 2006. He was also hired as a substitute in 1999 for about a year at schools in nearby Springville, he said.

Rinaldi said he removed Eisenman from the substitute-teacher list in May after rumors began circulating about his criminal past. "I didn't want a person with manslaughter working in the buildings," Rinaldi said, adding that he didn't realize until a few weeks ago that the conviction involved a child's death.

There have been no reports of improper behavior by Eisenman toward any of Gowanda's students, he said.

The Education Department said that when a criminal background search turned up his manslaughter conviction, it told Eisenman he would be denied clearance to teach. Eisenman wrote back to say the charge was related to reckless driving, stated he'd been a substitute teacher for 30 years and provided several references.

"Eisenman was cleared for employment based on false and misleading documentation he submitted ... in support of his request for employment clearance," the department said in a statement.

Tighter regulations enacted in 2007 would have allowed officials to delve deeper into the circumstances of Eisenman's felony background, Burman said.