Lamar County school failed to stop student’s sexual assault during class, lawsuit says
A lawsuit filed last week in Macon federal court claims that the Lamar County School District failed to protect a middle school student from being sexually assaulted by a classmate at school, despite knowing of his previous attempts to assault the student.
The student and her parents — who filed the suit under pseudonyms Jane, John and Janet Doe — said in the documents filed April 17 that, even after notifying Lamar County Middle School Principal Stephen Boyd of sexual assault attempts from one of her classmates, he failed to enact a plan that would separate both of them from having classes together.
The alleged attacker, who was referred to under the pseudonym James Smith, lured her into the woods during a physical education class and sexually assaulted her, the lawsuit alleges.
The student was 11 years old in 2023, when she was assaulted. Her alleged attacker was 13, according to the lawsuit. The victim has multiple conditions, including a learning disability, Oppositional Defiant Disorder, Attention Deficit Hyperactive Disorder and Generalized Anxiety Disorder, which made her more vulnerable toward her classmates’ alleged attacks, the lawsuit said.
The lawsuit also alleges that when school officials heard of the assault, they did not report the incident to the Division of Family and Children Services, even though the law requires it. The alleged attacker has not experienced any disciplinary action as a result of the incident, the lawsuit alleges.
In addition to Boyd and the Lamar County School District, physical education teachers Timothy Jones and Juan Diaz were also sued for failing to protect the student from being sexually assaulted during the class where the assault occurred. The student and her parents allege that their actions and inactions violate their daughter’s right not to be discriminated against in education under Title IX, which constitutes their negligence.
The alleged victim’s family is asking for damages and a jury trial.
A lawsuit represents only one side of a story, and those accused haven’t yet filed a reply to the suit. Jessica Watson, the Lamar County School District superintendent, declined to comment.
The student and her parents are represented by attorneys William Hunter, William Drought III, Kate Daly Cobb and David Dozier.
‘Bad things happen in the woods’
The student’s parents were first alerted to threats from the alleged attacker directed at their child when they discovered “inappropriate and sexually explicit messages via the Roblox app,” according to the lawsuit. It led the student’s mother to reach out to Boyd and report the alleged attacker’s behavior, as well as describe the student’s vulnerabilities and disabilities and the mother’s fear of the student being sexually assaulted.
In his reply, Boyd promised that he would talk to other school officials and “see where we can put either one of them so they are not in the same co-teach classes all day ... I will ensure they have new schedules,” according to the lawsuit.
The new schedules established that both of them would have physical education classes in different locations and with different teachers, but on April 26, 2023, the alleged attacker was present on the soccer field with the student “during a class period despite the alleged separation plan,” the lawsuit said.
The alleged attacker kicked the student’s soccer ball into the woods. When she went to look for the ball, he followed and sexually assaulted her.
Two students witnessed the incident and, when they saw the student, she looked to be “in a state of shock,” the lawsuit says. The incident was reported to the middle school’s counselor the day after, who then questioned the student about the assault without her parents being notified. In the afternoon, the counselor notified the student’s mother of the assault.
The student suffered severe psychological trauma after the incident and “regressed significantly in her basic self-care and refused to shower or brush her teeth,” the lawsuit said. She struggled to understand why she was assaulted and is terrified of the woods, getting frequent nightmares relating to the incident.
“(The student) does not want to live in a house near trees because ‘bad things happen in the woods,’” the lawsuit said.
