No settlement reached. Myers Park High sexual assault lawsuit headed to trial
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Title IX complaints in CMS
From lawsuits at Myers Park High to Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools reassigning administrators amid controversy, this is the latest on sexual assault cases and Title IX issues in the district.
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A sexual assault case involving Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools, the city of Charlotte and a former Myers Park High School student will go to a jury trial in January, the student’s attorney confirmed this week.
A former student listed in the lawsuit as Jane Doe to protect her identity contends school administrators and police mishandled her report of a sexual assault on campus in 2015. Their failings, she says, violated her Title IX rights.
Doe filed the complaint in November 2018. The trial is scheduled to begin Jan. 17 in North Carolina’s Western District Court. The development was first reported by The Charlotte Ledger.
While the court dismissed all claims against former CMS employee Anthony Perkins, CMPD officer Bradley Leak who was assigned to Myers Park High as a school resource officer and Kerr Putney, former chief of the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department, a pair of claims remain against the school district and city.
Those involved had a settlement conference Nov. 30 to resolve the case without having to go to trial.
Laura Dunn, who represents Doe, told The Charlotte Observer settlement conferences are confidential. Dunn, of L.L. Dunn Law Firm in Washington, D.C., said no information was available from the conference and she could not comment further other than to say she was preparing to go to trial.
Doe, who was 17 years old at the time of the incident, is seeking compensation for damages that include physical and psychological pain, suffering, impairment, lost wages, loss of educational opportunity, attorneys fees, costs and “further relief that justice may require,” according to the claim.
Caroline Kruk, a campus advocate for L.L. Dunn Law Firm, told the Observer on Wednesday they are not sharing the total amount of damages sought.
What is the claim against CMS?
Under a part of federal education law commonly referred to as Title IX, sexual violence on campus is considered a form of sex-based harassment, which federally funded school systems such as CMS are required to address when complaints arise.
The claim alleges officials did not take “immediate” action to help after seeing Doe, a junior at Myers Park High, being led into the woods within school property by an 18-year-old male student. Around the same time, according to the lawsuit, Doe texted her mom and friends was in danger. Within an hour, Doe says, she was picked up by the school resource officer near the woods, where she told him she had been sexually assaulted.
She alleges school officials dissuaded her from initiating a criminal investigation.
CMS not only failed to address female students’ reports of harassment at Myers Park High, the lawsuit states, but the district actually fostered a “hostile educational environment through a policy of deliberate indifference to known reports of sexual misconduct.”
The lawsuit alleges CMS’ policies were “inequitable and inadequate” and the district failed to provide training and education on Title IX to employees, students and parents.
In deciding whether to throw the case out, a judge wrote in 2021 initial evidence showed Doe’s report of sexual assault was not properly handled.
What is the claim against the city?
The lawsuit claims Charlotte and CMS failed to properly train their employees, including police officers working in schools, on how to report and respond to crimes of sexual assault.
CMS had a duty to train its employees ”on how to prevent and address crimes and related misconduct, such as abductions, rapes, and sexual harassment” and comply with related constitutionally and federally protected rights,” the lawsuit states.
CMPD failed to train its officers, which left them unequipped to prohibit or discourage “readily foreseeable conduct” the suit says.
Not the only case
Doe is one of many former students, the Observer has reported, to share stories of harassment or sexual violence on the Myers Park High campus. Harassment or sexual violence also were reported during the 2021-22 school year at Olympic and Hawthorne high schools. All have the same thing in common: alleged victims say CMS officials mishandled responses to reports.
Students organized protests and created petitions calling for greater transparency, better protocols and more education at school about how reports of sexual assault are handled.
Doe’s lawsuit is one of three filed against CMS. Former Myers Park High student Jill Roe filed a lawsuit in December 2019 that was settled for $50,000 in the spring.
Serena Evans, a former Myers Park High student and tennis player who says her report of being raped in a high school bathroom in 2016 wasn’t properly investigated, filed a lawsuit against the district in June.
In court filings, school officials largely deny students’ allegations. The district has taken steps to ensure student safety, including bolstering Title IX training for employees and students and making it easier to report an incident.
This story was originally published December 9, 2022 at 6:00 AM.
