MONROE, Wash. — The Monroe School District is being sued for allegedly allowing years of bullying, discrimination, and harassment to go unrecognized for years.
Attorney James Bible represents parents and students in the lawsuit filed on Thursday.
“The school district itself did little to nothing to protect these students,” Bible said during a press conference on Friday.
Many cases date back several years throughout elementary, middle and high schools.
In the lawsuit, students claim they were called racially derogatory names, assaulted, and mistreated.
“I just don’t really say anything because I feel like I’m the only one who if I do say something, there’s gonna be a whole bunch of kids looking to target me,” said student Myron Jr.
When they reported these incidents to school staff, students say little to nothing was done.
“They said they were gonna keep me safe. At the end of the day, that did not happen I still got into multiple fights. Overall they didn’t do anything at all,” said 12-year-old Ahmed.
Ahmed attended Fyrelands Elementary and Frank Wagner Elementary School from 2022 to 2023. He says the bullying got so bad that he feared for his safety.
“It made me feel like pretty unsafe and scared to go to school because everyone was kind of threatening me like ‘I’m gonna beat you up’ and stuff like that so I just felt like, I didn’t feel safe going to school every day,” Ahmed said.
Ahmed is one of several students who moved to another district to feel more accepted.
“When they have to go through life and dealing with this continual trauma, it destroys them,” said parent Junelle Lewis.
Lewis is a mom of eight who says years of discrimination at the school made lasting impacts on her kids.
“We’re their main advocate and we have to see the hurt. We have to see the crying in the room, them not wanting to go to school them saying maybe they would be better off not alive. You know we have to deal with that and I wouldn’t wish that anybody I wouldn’t wish that on my worst enemy,” Lewis said.
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