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Written by WiG
Jan 27, 2012
A former student who endured severe harassment throughout junior high and high school won a major settlement from the Aberdeen School District.
The ACLU of Washington represented Russell Dickerson III in the lawsuit against school district officials who knew the student was being harassed but did not take steps to end the torment.
Under terms of the settlement, Dickerson will receive $100,000 from the district. Additionally, the ACLU will receive $35,000 in legal fees.
“Public school officials must be held accountable when they fail to meet their responsibility to act decisively when a student is subjected to harassment by his peers. This settlement sends a message to school districts statewide to take strong action as soon as they learn that a student is being bullied,” said Sarah Dunne of the ACLU-WA.
Dickerson said, “I learned from my parents that you should never give up. You should fight for your rights – you don’t just walk away.”
Dickerson, now 20, is an African-American resident of Aberdeen, Wash. For six years, from 2003 when he entered junior high until 2009 when he graduated high school, other students harassed him on the basis of his race, sex and perceived sexual orientation.
At Miller Junior High, he was called names by other students and found notes in his backpack and taped to his back calling him “stupid nigger” and “dog.” Students tripped him in the hallways and threw food at him in the cafeteria. In one incident, three students pushed him to the floor in the hallway and smashed a raw egg on his head; only one of the students was disciplined.
At Aberdeen High School, the harassment escalated, with the student subjected to a barrage of insults. Dickerson suffered physical harassment, with other students pinching and fondling his chest, spitting on his head and throwing objects at him.
Although an assistant principal discouraged Dickerson from reporting misconduct by the student’s peers, the student and his parents repeatedly reported incidents of harassment to district administrators, both verbally and in writing.
A Grays Harbor Superior Court issued a no contact order between Dickerson and another student who had threatened publicly to lynch him. But at school, Dickerson only became the target of more harassment.
Filed in December 2010 in U.S. District Court in Tacoma, Wash., the ACLU lawsuit said that the deliberate indifference to ongoing harassment by the school district, which receives federal funds, violated federal law – Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972. The district’s negligent inaction also violated the Washington Law Against Discrimination.
