LEXINGTON — A multi-handicapped student’s family have filed a lawsuit against the Lexington Local School District Board of Education, superintendent Michael Ziegelhofer, Eastern Principal Buddy Miller, former teacher Laura Wesserling and former teacher’s aide Mary Sue Davis.
The plaintiffs, Denise Hayes and James Hayes, are seeking “compensatory damages in excess of compensatory damages,” according to the complaint they filed.
The complaint was filed March 23, 2018 at the United States District Court for the Northern District of Ohio, Eastern Division.
The plaintiffs’ attorney, Joel Levin, declined to comment, citing his client is a minor.
According to the complaint, the Hayes’ son — a multi-handicapped, non-verbal, largely wheelchair ridden child suffering from autism and cerebral palsy — was hit in the face with a clipboard on May 17, 2016 while attending Eastern Elementary School. The boy was 12-years-old at the time of the incident.
“When on the classroom floor, he was grabbed from behind by his hair and his head smashed into the ground,” the complaint reads. “When restrained, (the boy) was violently slapped in the face.”
The complaint alleges Davis as the perpetrator.
“All this abuse was foisted on the boy by a school employee, not for any educational or pedagogical purpose, but to hurt and to punish,” the complaint says. “The school district, school principal and school superintendent knew of the abuse, but did nothing. They did not investigate, did not report, but instead, allowed the student to continue to return to his school abuser daily, placing him in substantial risk of suffering more and more violent abuse.”
Ziegelhofer declined to comment. Two calls to his attorney, Patrick Vrobel, were unreturned at the time of publication.
The complaint alleges a second incident in which defendant Davis and the boy were alone in the classroom.
“(The boy) was sitting on the ground making loud sounds as he was watching cartoons on television. Defendant Davis grew increasingly and unreasonably angry at (him),” the complaint reads.
“She walked from across the room at her desk to directly behind him. She forcefully grabbed his face from the back, squeezed and covered his mouth, roughly pushed his face to the ground and grabbed and pulled the boy’s hair, ultimately causing him to forcefully fall backwards.”
This event happened around Sept. 30. The complaint said there is video.
The complaint says there is video of another incident in October 2016.
“Defendant Wesserling left the victim in the classroom alone with Davis for less than three minutes. She returned to find the boy upset and crying, with red marks and splotches on his face,” the complaint alleges. “Davis did nothing to pay any care or attention to the victim. Instead, Davis remained away from the boy, sitting at her desk, with her back towards (the boy) and ignoring the boy, and his condition. When Wesserling asked about what happened, Davis responded angrily with profanities, exclaiming how was she to know.”
The complaint says days later the boy was assaulted again.
On Dec. 2, 2016 the complaint cites the district sent a letter to Davis. She resigned Dec. 4. According to the complaint Wesserling was terminated in June 2017.
The lawsuit involves 12 counts ranging from denial of the boy’s due process rights to loss of consortium, according to the 27-page complaint.
