Kennedy Hunt P.C. recently filed a Human Rights lawsuit against Columbia Public Schools in the Thirteenth Judicial Circuit in Missouri, alleging that the public school district violated the Missouri Human Rights Act. According to the lawsuit, the school district discriminated against our client, a minor child, based on race and disability.
During the 2023-2024 school year, our client attended Jefferson Middle School. He is a minor African American child with disabilities, specifically autism, speech impairment, and sound system disorder. His disabilities are physical and mental impairments that substantially limit his major life activities, in that he struggles with communication, transitioning, and eloping. In educational settings, elopement refers to when a person, often a child, wanders or bolts away from a safe or supervised environment. For many individuals with developmental disabilities such as autism spectrum disorder, elopement is not an act of defiance or misbehavior, but rather an involuntary symptom of their disability.
Due to his disabilities, the school district is required under law to provide our client with reasonable accommodations, including specialized instruction, language therapy, and speech therapy.
According to the lawsuit, the school district violated our client’s rights on more than one occasion.
In August 2023, our client eloped from the classroom and retreated to a small adjacent room. Per the lawsuit, instead of implementing the protocols meant to de-escalate and accommodate our client’s needs, the teacher locked our client in a small room and escalated the matter by involving administration.
When our client became distressed and attempted to leave the confined space, an administrator blocked the exit and forcibly removed a device our client was using. Our client, showing signs of panic through self-stimulatory behavior, a common coping mechanism among students with disabilities, was then placed in a physical restraint. According to the lawsuit, rather than using established de-escalation techniques, the administration responded to our client’s distress with physical force. The legal filing further claims that the student suffered physical injuries, including bruising, as a result of the restraint.
In a separate incident, the student eloped, and the District responded by calling the Columbia Police Department.
Per the lawsuit:
When [the child’s mother] arrived at school, she saw [our client] on the floor trying to crawl through three police officers who were blocking the door and threatening to handcuff and arrest [our client], causing [him] to become extremely upset.
The lawsuit alleges that on August 28, 2023, Columbia Police Department officers referred the incident to a Juvenile Officer and charged our client with three counts of simple assault.
The lawsuit continues:
School District is more likely to call the police on African American students than Caucasian students. School District is more likely to suspend African American students than Caucasian students.
In January 2024, the child’s mother filed a charge of discrimination with the Missouri Commission on Human Rights, alleging racial discrimination, disability discrimination, and retaliation.
After this, the school district repeatedly suspended our client due to his behavior, specifically his attempts at eloping.
The lawsuit claims:
School District knows this behavior is due to [our client’s] disability, but still suspended him due to this behavior instead of trying to work on keeping [our client] in school.
The lawsuit also claims the in-school suspension room where our client was repeatedly held was a dirty room in the basement that used to be a girls’ locker room, has unfinished floors, and no windows.
The lawsuit states that our client’s mother repeatedly tried to work with the school district to find a reasonable accommodation for her son, including a modified school day for her son’s disability and the opportunity to engage in the interactive process. The school district denied this request.
The lawsuit alleges our client has suffered and will continue to suffer pain of mind and body, shock, emotional distress, physical manifestations of emotional distress, embarrassment, loss of self-esteem, disgrace, humiliation, and loss of enjoyment of life.
Our client is seeking actual damages against the Columbia School District, including emotional pain, suffering, inconvenience, mental anguish, loss of enjoyment of life, and other nonpecuniary losses, as well as attorney’s fees and costs.
This case is ongoing.
For more information, contact attorney Michelle Faron at michelle@kennedyhuntlaw.com. If you or someone you know has had their housing and/or disability rights violated, the skilled attorneys at Kennedy Hunt, P.C. may be able to help you. Fill out a questionnaire so we can understand your claim.