Sparkman Middle School in Toney, Ala.
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on September 17, 2014 at 8:21 PM, updated September 18, 2014 at 11:10 AM
HUNTSVILLE, Alabama — The federal government today sided with the guardian of a teenage girl who was raped during a botched sting operation in the boy’s bathroom, arguing the Madison County School system was liable under federal law to investigate harassment and protect female students.
“A school board cannot avoid summary judgment as a matter of law when a school administrator willfully ignores a plan to use a 14-year-old special needs student as bait to catch a student with a known history of sexual and violent misconduct, and as a result, the student is sodomized,” reads the federal brief filed in the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals late today.
The U.S. Department of Justice argues administrators at Sparkman Middle School near Huntsville knew the boy was dangerous and showed “deliberate indifference.”
“According to Principal (Ronnie) Blair,” reads today’s brief, “June Simpson, a teacher’s aide, reported that for several weeks, (a 16-year-old boy) had repeatedly been trying to get girls into the boys’ bathroom and in fact had sex with a student in the bathroom on the special needs students’ corridor.”
Blair rejected the aide’s recommendation that the boy be constantly watched, “and told Simpson that (the boy) could not be punished because he had not been ‘caught in the act,’ short-hand for the school’s policy that students could not be disciplined without substantiation of student-on-student misconduct.”
The brief states the teaching assistant then devised a plan to use the girl as bait.
“On January 22, 2010, while assisting custodians near the end of the day, (the 16-year-old boy) approached (the 14-year-old girl), who had already rebuffed his recent, repeated propositions to meet in the boys’ bathroom for sex,” reads the federal amicus brief filed late today.
“(The girl) immediately reported the incident to Simpson, a teacher’s aide, who suggested that (the girl) meet (the boy) in the bathroom where teachers could be positioned to catch him ‘in the act’ before anything happened. (The girl) initially refused, but then acquiesced.”
The federal brief highlights, over several paragraphs, the boy’s history of sexual aggression and violence. He hit a student in 2008…