The Grove City Area School District fired its private security firm after learning the company employed guards who are felons, including one sex offender.

According to Channel 11’s news exchange partners at TribLIVE, two former supervisors at Pond Security accused the company of breaking at least two state laws by hiring a felon to work as a security guard and stationing another guard with sex crimes on his record inside public schools.

"I'm very disappointed with the whole thing," Grove City Area School System Superintendent Richard Mextorf said, who confirmed the district dismissed Pond Security on Wednesday. "You hire a company to do a service, and then you get swept up in this kind of stuff.

"Our first responsibility is that people here aren't putting the kids in danger. The safety and security of the kids is No. 1," Mextorf said.

Kelly Seiber, the executive director of Pond Security in the United States, acknowledged that the guards had criminal backgrounds but said the company did not know about one of them; Noble Ramsey, a felon from Aliquippa.

"When we found that he had a criminal record, we fired him," Seiber said. "We take these things very seriously."

She said she received clearance from prosecutors to hire the other guard, Dennis Leroy Claypoole Jr., a registered sex offender from Grove City.

Eric Colamarino was a supervisor at Shaler-based Pond Security, and said he resigned after he claims the firm paid no attention to what he uncovered about the two guards with police records on the payroll.

“He had a record of felony drug convictions,” Colamarino said. “He wasn’t permitted by state law to be employed as a security guard in Pennsylvania, let along be in a school district.”

Pond Security said it is working to reclaim the school district’s confidence in the company.