Judge cites safety risk, grants Arkansas school district's plea to ban boy, 15

Citing "significant interest in maintaining school safety," a federal judge has granted the Vilonia School District's request to keep a 15-year-old student who is considered a possible safety risk to students and staff members from immediately returning to the district's Freshman Academy for ninth-graders.

In a move attorneys believe is unprecedented in Arkansas, but that has occurred in a few other states, the district sued the boys' parents March 27 to halt a "stay-put" provision in federal law that requires suspended special education students to return to their most-recent placement -- in this case, a regular classroom -- after 10 days of suspension, at least until a final administrative decision on placement can be made.

The provision would have required the school to readmit the boy despite pictures he recently posted of himself holding a gun, and homicidal and suicidal remarks he allegedly made to others, until an administrative decision expected later this month.

The district said that after looking into a March 1 social media posting that was reported to Principal Ronnie Simmons by another student's parents, school officials uncovered other photos on the boy's phone, which he willingly showed them, and learned of conversations he'd had with other students and a teaching intern. In those conversations, the officials said, he talked about shooting to kill and not injure and reportedly said he wanted to kill someone and spend the rest of his life in prison.

The boy's parents said he was just citing rap lyrics and using a method taught in a special-education class to control his thoughts, and that he would never harm anyone. They conceded he had recently been treated for suicidal thoughts but said his medication was adjusted and he was improving.

The parents also said the boy's remarks were a manifestation of his disability, which under federal law needs to be taken into consideration.

The law says that if there was a direct and substantial relationship between the child's disability and the actions that led to the disciplinary actions, as was determined in the boy's case, the child must stay in the same educational environment, as opposed to being schooled in a day treatment center or being homebound.

Until his suspension March 6, he had been attending mostly regular classes throughout the current school year, even though the district had tried, unsuccessfully, to place him in an "alternative learning environment" in January.

A neuropsychological evaluation conducted last spring determined that the boy suffers from multiple disorders, including traumatic brain injury; memory, psycho-motor, frontal lobe and executive function deficits; depression; and oppositional defiant disorder.

His mother testified April 6, in a hearing before U.S. District Judge Kristine Baker, that she adopted him as a 2-year-old child who was believed to have possible brain damage as a result of his birth mother slamming his head against a wall repeatedly.

In a ruling filed Wednesday evening, ahead of an administrative hearing in Vilonia that began Thursday, Baker enjoined the stay-put provision of the Individuals with Disabilities in Education Act until the hearing officer appointed by the state Department of Education can determine the best placement for the boy.

The administrative hearing is expected to last several days, and then the hearing officer will decide in another 10 days or so whether to grant the district's request for a 45-day alternative placement for the boy while parents and safety experts look more closely at whether he poses a danger if he returns to the campus.

"We just want to make sure the school is safe for everybody," attorney Jay Bequette, who represents the district, said Thursday during a break in the administrative hearing.

Theresa Caldwell, a Maumelle attorney who represents the boy and his parents, couldn't be reached for comment.

The district filed its suit in Faulkner County Circuit Court, but Caldwell transferred it to federal court, citing the boy's rights under federal law. In her 49-page ruling Wednesday, Baker also denied the district's request to send the case back to the state court.

She said that while she "accepts as true" testimony that the boy is remorseful for his actions and has worked hard during treatment, she "must examine this case in the context of relative injuries to the parties and to the public."

The Individuals with Disabilities in Education Act requires state and local educational agencies that accept federal funding to provide a "free and appropriate public education" for disabled students. Baker's order noted that "the scheme as a whole reflects congressional recognition that disabled children had been commonly 'excluded from the public school system altogether' or 'warehoused' in special classes, or were neglectfully shepherded through the system until they were old enough to drop out.'"

The federal law established procedural safeguards to ensure disabled students can obtain a free and appropriate public education, primarily by establishing an individualized education program for each student based on the child's unique needs, Baker pointed out.

Under the law, she said, children with disabilities "have the right to an education in the least restrictive setting, and to the maximum extent possible, they must be 'mainstreamed' with nonhandicapped students."

Baker said a preliminary injunction was warranted because the school district showed a likelihood that the boy could harm himself or others. But she said she also declined to label him "a dangerous child" or determine his motives, which his parents called "a cry for help."

Metro on 04/13/2018

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