KeynoteUSA—
Two families have filed a federal lawsuit against Tennessee Governor Bill Lee and the Williamson County School District, alleging that their high school children were arrested, strip-searched, placed in solitary confinement, forced to undergo evaluations and placed on house arrest after officials misinterpreted a Tennessee case. statute and claimed that peer-to-peer conversations were “threats of mass violence.”
The lawsuit arises from two separate and unrelated incidents that occurred in August 2023, in which a pair of students were accused of making threatening speeches. However, according to the lawsuit, the speech used by the high school students in the two separate incidents did not rise to the level of a threat of mass violence nor did it amount to actions “that a reasonable person would conclude would result in serious bodily injury.” ”or the death of two or more persons, as defined in Tennessee Statute 39-16-517.
The lawsuit challenges how school officials applied Tennessee Statute 39-16-517, a 2021 “zero tolerance” law that addresses communications of threats of mass violence on school property or at school-related events and Requires districts to expel students for one year if they have been found to have made threats of mass violence.
In an incident that occurred on August 10, 2023, a 14-year-old boy, identified as BN, was accused by a fellow student of threatening to have a gun in his backpack, shoot up at school, and have a bomb in his house, affirms the boy denied.
The boy said his only mention of guns was when he told friends about a lunchtime conversation he had with another boy who had described firearms his grandfather owned.
After interviews with school officials and police, BN “was arrested for violating” the Tennessee statute titled “Threat of Mass Violence on School Property,” according to the lawsuit.
He was placed in solitary confinement for 24 hours and required to strip naked and put on his jail jumpsuit while an adult guard had his back turned, according to the lawsuit.
BN was jailed for four days and then placed under house arrest in the custody of his parents, according to the lawsuit. He was “completely prohibited from entering any Williamson County school grounds,” according to the lawsuit. BN also faced a 365-day suspension under zero-tolerance rules.
According to court documents, after BN appealed the suspension, Williamson County Superintendent Jason Golden concluded that BN created a rumor “of a gun threat” at the school, and although the “prank caused a disturbance at the school” , I could return.
“You can blame Gov. Bill Lee,” Page High School Principal Eric Lifsey allegedly told the 14-year-old boy and his mother. “We don’t think of you as a threat. That was never the case,” the lawsuit says.
KeynoteUSA has contacted Lifsey for comment.
A spokesperson for Williamson County Schools said in an email to KeynoteUSA that the district does not comment on pending litigation.
Governor Lee’s office has not responded to KeynoteUSA’s request for comment.
“Tennessee’s new zero tolerance law is being used as a cudgel against children who engage in innocuous behavior typical of all teenagers,” Larry Crain, an attorney for the families, said in a statement to KeynoteUSA.
The second incident occurred on August 22, 2023. According to the lawsuit, school officials said the text from a 13-year-old Fairview Middle School student, identified as HM, was considered a “threat of mass violence.”
The text, which was sent in a school email group chat, read: “On Thursday we will kill all the Mexicos.”
According to court documents, the full transcript of the chat, later obtained by HM’s mother, showed that other girls within the chat were making fun of HM for “looking Mexican because of her darker complexion.”
After a friend asked HM what he was doing on Thursday, HM “jokingly responded, ‘On Thursday we killed all the Mexicans,’” the lawsuit says.
HM was arrested at school, taken to the Williamson County Juvenile Detention Center, forced to submit to a strip search, take a shower while a camera was focused on her, and placed in a cell where she was interrogated by individuals who questioned her. whether she had ever had sex, an abortion, or suicidal thoughts.
HM was also suspended from school and ordered to be evaluated for mental illness. She was offered the option of voluntary or involuntary commitment to determine whether she was competent to stand trial, according to the lawsuit.
The lawsuit says the two students “suffered serious and serious emotional injury” and were “unable to adequately cope with the mental stress” of the circumstances surrounding their cases.
Since filing the lawsuit, Crain said in his statement to KeynoteUSA that his office has learned of “several more children who have been wrongfully handed over to criminal prosecution” by the school district.
“This lawsuit seeks to declare unconstitutional this new law applied to innocent acts of these children,” he said. “It also seeks compensatory damages against the school district for violating its own internal school board policies and routinely referring children to criminal proceedings.”
Everytown for Gun Safety released a 2022 report on stopping school shootings and gun violence, in the wake of the mass shooting at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, earlier that year.
The report, which calls for the need to take meaningful action against gun violence in American schools, focuses on approaches that have been shown to be most effective and says the majority of students facing crises will never act violently and should not be treated as criminals. So-called “zero tolerance” policies, like those in Tennessee, “may end up punishing students who exhibit behavior that actually requires compassionate intervention,” the report says.
According to research from Everytown, zero-tolerance policies can create a “threatening climate that instills fear and erodes students’ trust,” which can discourage them from sharing information when they are worried about their classmates. Research shows that these policy approaches have had a “profoundly negative effect” on students of color.
“Our recommended practice is the opposite of ‘zero tolerance’ and is not based on a punitive or criminal justice approach and should not rely on exclusionary discipline as a means of intervention,” Everytown’s report says.
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