Doe v. Ohio Hi-Point Sch. Dist. Bd. of Educ.
| Decision Date | 28 March 2022 |
| Docket Number | 2:20-cv-4798 |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Southern District of Ohio |
| Parties | JANE DOE, ET AL., Plaintiffs, v. OHIO HI-POINT SCHOOL DISTRICT BOARD OF EDUCATION, et. al., Defendants. |
OPINION AND ORDER
This matter is before the Court on Defendant Donna Jean Williams (“Defendant Williams”), Guardian of Defendant Minor Student 1 (“Defendant J.C.”) and Defendant J.C.'s Joint Motion to Dismiss All Claims Asserted Against Them Pursuant to Federal Rules of Civil Procedure 12(b)(1), 12(b)(6), and 28 U.S.C. § 1367. (ECF No. 23.) For the reasons stated herein, the Joint Motion of Defendants J.C. and Williams is GRANTED IN PART and DENIED IN PART. (Id.)
Plaintiffs Jane Doe, her mother Mary Doe, her father John Doe, and sister Jenny Doe (collectively, “Plaintiffs”) have filed an eighty-four page, eighteen-count complaint seeking declaratory, injunctive, and/or legal relief against forty-eight different named and unnamed defendants. (ECF No 3.) The action, in short, challenges the various forms of gender- and disability-based harassment and discrimination that Plaintiff Jane Doe allegedly endured while attending the Ohio Hi-Point Career Center (the “Ohio Hi-Point Center”) in Bellefontaine, Ohio. (Id. at PageID #93.) It asserts, specifically, that from August through November 2019, Plaintiff Jane Doe, as an Ohio Hi-Point Center student, “was continually bullied, harassed, assaulted, battered, [and] raped” by her fellow peers; that Plaintiff Jane Doe and her family “repeatedly pleaded” with various Ohio Hi-Point Center officials to help stop these attacks; and that those pleas, in essence, fell on deaf ears. (Id.)
The forty-eight defendants listed in Plaintiffs' Complaint can be separated into three factions: (i) the organizations, administrators, and teachers affiliated with the Ohio Hi-Point Center (the “Ohio Hi-Point Defendants”);[1] (ii) Plaintiff Jane Doe's student peers at the Ohio Hi-Point Center, including Defendant J.C. (the “Student Defendants”);[2] and (iii) Defendant Williams, who, at the time, was the guardian of Defendant J.C (collectively, “Defendants”). (ECF No. 3.)
(Id. at ¶ 40) (“Rape #1”). Plaintiffs allege that Defendant J.C. “carried out Rape #1 while in the custody, care, and control of” Defendant Williams, his grandmother and then-legal guardian. (Id. at ¶¶ 40-41.)
After Rape #1, Plaintiffs allege that many of Plaintiff Jane Doe's classmates-including Defendant J.C.-continued to sexually harass, physically threaten, and bully her. (Id. at ¶¶ 47-57, 64, 66, 68, 80, 129-31, 139, 143, 147.) They assert that “[o]ver the course of the next two months, ” Plaintiffs Mary, Dan, and Jane Doe “made more than 25 reports to [various] Ohio Hi-Point Defendants regarding” this abuse, but that these school officials “failed to respond” to Plaintiff Jane Doe's situation. (Id. at ¶ 47; see Id. at ¶ 81, 83-84, 91.) Some even allegedly encouraged it. (Id. at ¶¶ 67-68, 78.)
On October 2, 2019, Plaintiffs Jane, Mary, and Dan Doe met with various school administrators-including Defendant Jon Cook and Defendant Tonya Ramey-to discuss Defendant J.C.'s persistent harassment (the “October 2 Meeting”). (Id. at ¶¶ 89-91.) There, Defendant Ramey allegedly stated that Defendant J.C.'s conduct constituted “dating violence and abuse, ” and “admitt[ed] that she had seen some of it herself.” (Id. at ¶ 91.) Defendant Ramey allegedly further noted that, since Plaintiff Jane Doe was eighteen by that point, it was her obligation to “file charges” against Defendant J.C. (Id. at ¶ 91.) The next day, the school issued a “No Contact Order” which prohibited Plaintiff Jane Doe from contacting Defendant J.C. (Id. at ¶ 95.)
The day before the October 2 Meeting, Plaintiff Jane Doe was suspended from school. (Id. at ¶¶ 83-84.) On October 7, 2019, Plaintiffs Jane, Mary, and Dan Doe met with Defendants Ramey and Robin Harrington to appeal this suspension (the “October 7 Meeting”). (Id. at ¶ 98.) There, Defendant Ramey announced that the school had launched a “sexual harassment investigation” into Plaintiff Jane Doe's allegations and “identified herself as the Title IX Investigator.” (Id.) At the same meeting, Plaintiff Jane Doe allegedly “disclosed to everyone in attendance” that Defendant J.C. had raped her the month prior. (Id. at ¶ 99.) This allegation, Plaintiffs assert, was laughed off by Defendants Ramey and Harrington. (Id. at ¶ 100.) Plaintiffs further allege that, from that day forward, Defendants Ramey and Harrington “failed to report the rape to the appropriate authorities.” (Id. at ¶ 104.)
On October 30, 2019, Plaintiffs allege that another classmate of Plaintiff Jane Doe, Defendant Minor Student 2, raped her on school grounds (“Rape #2”). (Id. at ¶ 143.) This event, too, was allegedly reported to, and disregarded by, Defendant Ramey. (See Id. at ¶ 155.)
On November 11, 2019, Plaintiff Jane Doe was admitted to the emergency room of the Mary Rutan Hospital to receive treatment for “ongoing panic attacks, injuries from Rape #1 and Rape #2, and severe mental and emotional distress from the bullying, harassment, sexual assault, and abuse” she endured. (Id. at ¶ 176.) After this visit, she took medical leave from the Ohio Hi-Point Center for the rest of the academic year, and, eventually, unenrolled from the school. (Id. at ¶¶ 176, 201-06.)
On September 16, 2020, Plaintiffs filed the instant action. (Id.)
Plaintiffs allege that the physical and emotional abuse Plaintiff Jane Doe endured in the two-plus months she attended the Ohio Hi-Point Center manifested “trauma, severe physical pain, mental distress, anxiety, loss of enjoyment of life, [and] physical impairment” and “wholly and completely deprived [her] of an education[;]” that both she and her parents, Plaintiffs Dan and Mary Doe, have had to pay for medical treatment resulting from those injuries; and that, as a result of her trauma, Plaintiffs Dan, Mary, and Jenny Doe have “lost the companionship and consortium of Plaintiff Jane Doe.” (Id. at ¶¶ 235-37.) To gain relief for these injuries, they assert eighteen different federal- or state-law causes of action.
Of the eighteen counts in Plaintiffs' Complaint, five are federal in nature. These include:
Of the Complaint's thirteen remaining counts, three-Counts XVI through XVIII-request punitive damages and declaratory/injunctive relief. Eight implicate one or both of Defendants J.C. and Williams. These include:
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