Lawsuit accuses Bellingham Public Schools of failing to protect student from repeated sexual abuse

The parents of an elementary school student have sued Bellingham Public Schools for allegedly failing to protect their son from repeated sexual assaults perpetrated by another male student while they were on a school bus, and for failing to report the allegations to law enforcement or state child welfare officials.

The parents of the 10-year-old boy filed their civil lawsuit June 24 in Whatcom County Superior Court against Bellingham Public Schools.

The lawsuit alleges the school district knew the male student, age 9, had a documented history of sexually abusing other children while on the school bus prior to abusing the 10-year-old boy; that the district has a special protective relationship with the children in its care and was negligent and failed in its duties to protect the 10-year-old and other children from the 9-year-old child; and that the district failed in its obligations to report the sexual abuse to law enforcement or state child welfare officials, as is required by law , according to court records obtained by The Herald.

“As a direct and proximate cause of these breaches and failures, (the victim) was needlessly and repeatedly sexually assaulted and raped by offending student … while on BSD’s school bus,” the lawsuit states.

All school district employees are mandatory reporters and are required by state law to report any suspected abuse or neglect of a child to law enforcement or to the Washington State Department of Children, Youth & Families . State law requires the report be made at the first opportunity available, but no longer than 48 hours after there is reasonable cause to believe that a child has suffered abuse or neglect.

The parents allege that, because of the district’s failures, their son has suffered and continues to suffer emotional, psychological and other damages, and that their relationship with him has been damaged.

They are seeking general and special damages, reasonable attorneys’ fees and costs, and any other relief the court deems just and proper, according to the records.

The school district has 20 days from when it was served with the lawsuit to respond.

“Bellingham Public Schools takes seriously our duty to protect and care for all students, and we are committed to standing with victims and survivors of any type of sexual misconduct, harassment or assault,” the school district said in a July 1 emailed statement to The Herald and posted on the district’s website July 2.

The district said it was aware of the lawsuit and that “these types of allegations are upsetting. Many of our staff are parents, and we deeply understand the gravity of this subject,” Bellingham Public Schools Superintendent Greg Baker’s July 2 statement reads.

The district said it could not provide many details due to student privacy laws and the pending lawsuit, but that staff work closely with students and families involved, as well as law enforcement and state child welfare officials, while using the district’s policies and procedures.

“This situation is sensitive and complex. We understand the community’s concerns, and we are sorry that we are unable to provide additional information,” Baker’s Tuesday afternoon statement says.

“The health, safety and welfare of students is always the paramount concern of Bellingham School District. As such, any harm or injury to a student is extremely troubling to the school district. Bellingham School District is aware of the pending lawsuit, but I have instructed the school district not to provide any comment on the pending litigation,” the district’s attorneys, Michael McFarland and Sean Harkins, said in a July 1 statement to The Herald. McFarland and Harkins are attorneys with Evans, Craven & Lackie law firm out of Spokane , which specializes in business, employment, government liability and various malpractice defense, according to the firm’s website.

The Herald has reached out to the parents’ attorney, the school district and the Bellingham Police Department for more information and comment.

It is Bellingham Herald policy to avoid identifying potential victims of domestic and sexual violence when possible.

Prior assaults

The lawsuit accuses the school district of not only knowing the 9-year-old male student had been accused of sexually assaulting at least two other male children on the school bus prior to repeatedly sexually assaulting the 10-year-old boy during the 2022-2023 school year, but that the district failed to report the previous assaults, failed to institute an appropriate “safety plan” to protect other students from the 9-year-old, and attempted to use other students as a way to chaperone the 9-year-old while on the bus after allegations of abuse were disclosed to school officials, according to court records.

Both the 9-year-old student and 10-year-old student attended Wade King Elementary School during the 2022-2023 school year and rode the bus. The district knew the 9-year-old student had a history of sexually assaulting other students while on the school bus, according to the lawsuit.

In October 2022, the 9-year-old was accused of sexually assaulting a male student while the pair were on the bus. The 9-year-old allegedly encouraged the other student to sit next to him on the bus. Once seated next to one another, the 9-year-old sexually touched the other student, assaulting him, the court records state.

The victim reported the sexual abuse to his parents, who notified the school district of the assault, the records state.

The lawsuit claims the district should have fulfilled its mandatory reporting obligations and reported the sexual abuse to law enforcement or child welfare officials. The district also should have created a safety plan to protect other students, including requiring that the 9-year-old student no longer ride the school bus, that alternative transportation be provided for him or that a trained adult or paraprofessional sit with him while on the bus to ensure he did not abuse additional students.

“Neither reasonably prudent action was taken by the District. Instead, and quite incredulously, the District allowed the offending student to continue to ride the bus,” court documents state.

The district also allegedly asked the school bus driver to identify several older students who could sit next to the 9-year-old student on the bus. The lawsuit claims the district did not notify the students or their parents that they were being seated next to the 9-year-old as a way to chaperone him to keep him from sexually assaulting other students, records show.

Following the implementation of a “safety plan” put in place by the district after the first boy’s allegations were reported, the 9-year-old student was accused of raping a second boy while they were seated next to one another on the bus, according to court documents.

The second boy reported the sexual abuse to his parents, who also notified the school district.

The lawsuit claims the district should have reported the second boy’s allegations to law enforcement or child welfare officials, and that it should have modified its “safety plan” by removing the 9-year-old child from the bus indefinitely.

“But remarkably, Defendant District did nothing,” the lawsuit claims. “Two credible sexual assaults by two young boys were reported, and the District did nothing.”

Spanning a roughly four-month period in spring 2023, and roughly four months after the first boy’s assaults were disclosed, the 9-year-old child repeatedly sexually assaulted and raped the 10-year-old child — the third victim — while on the bus, according to court documents.

The two boys sat next to one another at least six times throughout spring 2023, court records show.

The 10-year-old reported the sexual abuse to his parents, who notified the district and law enforcement.

A search conducted by The Herald of juvenile court cases filed between June 1, 2023 through the current date do not show any cases with matching allegations.

Title IX investigation

At some point after the start of June 2023, the school district initiated a Title IX investigation into the 10-year-old boy’s allegations, the lawsuit shows.

During an interview with school district investigators, the boy told them he initially believed he and the 9-year-old boy were playing a game. He said the 9-year-old student told him they would pretend they were sleeping, that while they were sleeping “we are going to pretend we don’t know what happens to us,” and that what they were doing was a secret, an excerpt from the Title IX investigation included in the lawsuit states.

The 9-year-old also allegedly placed his backpack on the edge of the bus seat to block others’ view of what they were doing, and told the 10-year-old to stop whenever the bus stopped moving, according to court records.

The district’s Title IX investigator recommended that the district’s decision-maker conclude that the 9-year-old student’s actions constituted sexual harassment, court records state.

A second allegation included in the district’s Title IX investigation alleged that the 10-year-old boy had reported multiple previous incidents to school officials prior to early June 2023, in which the 9-year-old student sexually abused him while they were on the bus.

Bus footage reviewed by district investigators showed that the two students sat together six times during a monthlong span in spring 2023. While nothing in the footage — which does not show what was occurring in the bus seats — explicitly showed sexual misconduct, there are “details in the footage that align with details supporting the allegations and accounts” from both the 10-year-old student and other witnesses, court documents state.

Other children who rode the bus were also interviewed and corroborated the 10-year-old student’s accounts of the sexual abuse, court records state.

The Title IX investigator also recommended the district’s decision-maker conclude that the 9-year-old boy repeatedly sexually assaulted the 10-year-old child during spring 2023 while they were on the bus, the court records show.

The district’s policies and procedures on sexual harassment of students state the district will promptly take appropriate action to investigate and will take effective steps “reasonably calculated to end harassment, eliminate any hostile environment, prevent its recurrence and remedy its effects as appropriate.”

The district’s procedure on sexual harassment states that if a sexual assault is alleged to have occurred , the school principal will immediately inform the district’s Title IX coordinator, inform law enforcement and notify the student victim and their parent or guardian of their right to file a criminal complaint and a sexual harassment complaint simultaneously. The district will also notify and provide supportive measures to the student victim, the procedure states.

The district will designate a Title IX coordinator, who ensures the district complies with state and federal regulations, and will also designate a decision-maker who will reach the final determination of responsibility for the conduct alleged to violate Title IX. The decision-maker will either be Baker, the superintendent, or another designee, the district’s procedure states.

The decision-maker’s report will include details regarding any corrective measures the district will take and notice of any possible sanctions or discipline for the perpetrators. Corrective measures deemed necessary will be instituted as quickly as possible, but no later than 30 days following the mailing of the decision-maker’s written response to the victim and state education officials, the district’s procedure states.

The district will also conduct additional follow-up inquiries with the victim and their parent or legal guardian to see if there have been any new incidents, the district’s website states.

In his statement July 2, Baker said Bellingham Public Schools staff members receive a variety of training related to their mandatory reporting duties.

Every fall, prior to the start of the school year, employees review state laws and the district’s policies and procedures , including those related to mandatory reporting and sexual harassment . Staff are also required to complete online trainings on safety and education topics through a third-party company called Vector Solutions , including two 25-minute trainings titled “Bullying: Recognition & Response” and “Child Abuse: Mandatory Reporting.” The district’s human resources department tracks employee participation and compliance with these trainings, according to Baker’s statement.

All district administrators receive annual Title IX training, and all new employees review mandatory reporting laws, and the district’s policies and procedures related to sexual harassment. New employees also go through a Vector Solutions training titled “What Every Employee Must Be Told,” which reportedly discusses topics related to child abuse , including mandatory reporting, discrimination and sexual harassment, according to the district’s July 2 statement.

The Herald has asked the district whether these policies and procedures were followed in this situation.

Duty of care

The lawsuit accuses the district of violating the special protective relationship it has with the students entrusted in its care.

The district has a duty to protect students from “reasonably foreseeable harm” and to “control individuals who present reasonably foreseeable harms to students,” the lawsuit states.

Because the district knew the 10-year-old boy has autism, received special education services and that he is vulnerable to acts of bullying, harassment and other misconduct, and knew that the 9-year-old boy had previously been accused of sexually assaulting at least two other students while on the bus, the district failed in its duty to protect the 10-year-old from the “reasonably foreseeable harm” that the 9-year-old would sexually abuse him, the lawsuit alleges.

“As a direct and proximate cause of these and other breaches and failures, (the victim) was subjected to repeated acts of rape and sexual assault while on the school bus. The District repeatedly failed to protect (the victim) and control (the 9-year-old boy), and the inevitable occurred: (the victim) was repeatedly sexually abused on the Defendant’s school bus,” the lawsuit states.

The district is also accused of failing to report the sexual assaults of the first two boys to either law enforcement or child welfare officials. Because of this failure to report, the 9-year-old boy did not receive intervention services for his alleged sexual abuse of other students and measures to control his behaviors and protect other students were not put in place, which ultimately resulted in him sexually assaulting the 10-year-old student, the lawsuit claims.

Because of the district’s negligence and failures, the relationship between the 10-year-old and his parents has been damaged, the lawsuit alleges.

The victim “has suffered immense damages that are significant and ongoing,” court records state.

Prior reporting failures

The lawsuit comes roughly seven months after three Bellingham Public Schools administrators resolved the criminal cases against them alleging that they failed to report a Squalicum High School female student’s repeated sexual assaults to law enforcement or child welfare officials, The Herald previously reported.

In that case, all three administrators were charged with one count of failure to report , a gross misdemeanor . They entered into an agreed-upon deferred prosecution agreement Dec. 5, where the Whatcom County Prosecuting Attorney’s Office agreed to continue the criminal cases for roughly 90 days while the administrators did community service. Following that, the prosecutor’s office stated it would dismiss the charges against all three administrators.

The Herald has asked court officials for an update regarding whether the three administrators’ cases were dismissed.

The female student who disclosed the sexual assaults to school district officials filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against the district Dec. 7, 2022. Her lawsuit is still pending, federal court records show.

The student, who withdrew from the high school and began attending another school, accuses the district in her lawsuit of violating her federal Title IX rights , failing its duty to protect and care for her and neglecting its duties to report the sexual assaults to law enforcement.

She previously sought $1 million in damages from the district before filing the federal lawsuit, The Herald previously reported.

The district denied it mishandled the student’s reports in its January 2023 response to the lawsuit. The district said it took reasonable steps to stop the reported harassment, that the assault allegations contained in the student’s lawsuit were not reported to the administrators and that the conduct that was reported to them was not considered abuse or neglect under state law .

The school district said in a late-August email to The Herald that it continued to support the administrators, that it believes they acted in good faith and that it did not believe any of the three violated any policies. Baker, the district superintendent, reiterated this sentiment in a Dec. 5 statement , and said the information the administrators received did not require a mandatory report to law enforcement or child welfare officials.

Resources

▪ Brigid Collins Family Support Center: 360-734-4616, brigidcollins.org

Brigid Collins Family Support Center professionals are on-call between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m., Monday through Friday, to answer questions about children, families, abuse prevention or treatment at (360) 734-4616.

▪ Child Protective Services: Washington state hotline for reporting child abuse and neglect, 866-829-2153.

▪ Domestic Violence & Sexual Assault Services : 24-hour Help Line: 360-715-1563, Email: info@dvsas.org.

▪ Lummi Victims of Crime : 360-312-2015.

▪ Tl’ils Ta’á’altha Victims of Crime: 360-325-3310 or nooksacktribe.org/departments/youth-family-services/tlils-taaaltha-victims-of-crime-program/

▪ Bellingham Police : You can call anonymously at 360-778-8611, or go online at cob.org/tips .

▪ WWU Consultation and Sexual Assault Support Survivor Advocacy Services: 360-650-3700 or wp.wwu.edu/sexualviolence/ .

If you or a child is in immediate danger, call 911 and make a report to law enforcement.

To report child abuse or neglect call 1-866-END HARM.