OH: Two families suing schools after assaults

Girls forced into oral sex while on bus, they say
Thursday, November 20, 2008 3:28 AM
By Jodi Andes and Charlie Boss

THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH
Two middle-school girls say they were raped on school buses, one in the South-Western district and the other in Bloom-Carroll.

One girl said the trouble started earlier, when she was sexually harassed in school. She said officials did nothing and the harassment escalated until she was forced to perform oral sex during a bus ride.

The other girl said she, too, was forced to perform oral sex. She said the aftermath also was unsettling: School officials did nothing to separate her from the boy, she said, and other students taunted her with lewd comments when they learned what had happened.

The districts said the girls, both 12 at the time of the alleged incidents, were involved in consensual sexual relationships.

Now, both girls' families have filed separate lawsuits in U.S. District Court in Columbus.

Experts say that teens tend to push boundaries to explore their sexuality, but schools don't give clear and consistent messages of what's OK and what's not.

"The system isn't working as is," said Richelle Frabotta, who helps schools put on sex-education training workshops. She is director of education services with the Southern Ohio Sexuality Education and Consultation Services.

She said schools need policies that define inappropriate behavior, and teachers and staff members should be trained to deal with those situations.

"You can't blame the kids. You can't blame them for their behaviors. You've got to have consequences," Frabotta said. "If we don't intervene, if we're too busy or if perhaps principals and administrators are fearful, then those are issues that have to be addressed." Both South-Western and Bloom-Carroll have student handbooks and districtwide policies that prohibit sexual harassment and displays of affection. Officials from the districts note they also provide staff training for dealing with these situations.

Michael Garth Moore, an attorney for the girl in the South-Western case, said children are becoming increasingly sexualized, but he thinks schools have been reluctant to respond.

"What I've been shocked at is both the sexual content of the communications between kids in MySpace and e-mail," Moore said of his work as a defense attorney. "Administrators seem to be woefully inadequate in how they handle these sexually heightened environments (that continue) in schools and buses."

The cases are not the first in central Ohio to indicate that schools can be sexual minefields.

A 2005 assault in the Mifflin High School auditorium revealed that the stage area where it occurred had been used for sex before. Detectives found used condoms in the area.

Officials at South-Western and Bloom-Carroll would not comment specifically on the court cases but said that both complaints have inaccuracies.

"It's frustrating," Bloom-Carroll Superintendent Roger Mace said. "Administrators and other school personnel can't put the facts out there that are true in situations like this until it's over."

The teen boy in the Bloom-Carroll case was charged with two delinquency counts of rape and pleaded guilty to a delinquency count of menacing by stalking, said Lt. Gary Kennedy of the Fairfield County sheriff's office.

He said the girl, who was 12 at the time, was having a consensual sexual relationship with the boy, who was then 17. The girl told deputies she agreed to perform oral sex on the teen on the bus, but he was charged with rape because of the difference in their ages, Kennedy said.

However, the lawsuit against the district says the girl was forced to perform the act, reported the abuse and then was suspended for it.

The girl at Finland Middle School in the South-Western case said she and a friend were harassed for more than two years. Boys groped them and made lewd comments.

The girls complained to school officials, but no disciplinary action was taken, they said. After that, boys pulled down one girl's pants and exposed one of the other's breasts while holding her down.

In May, a boy sat down next to one of the girls on the bus and asked for oral sex. She said she refused, but he forced her to feel his erection and then forced her head onto his penis.

At the time, the girl was 12 and the boy, 14.

John Albert, the attorney representing the school district, said administrators fully investigated the complaint, followed their policies and determined that it was a consensual act.

Franklin County deputy sheriffs have charged the boy with a delinquency count of rape and gross sexual imposition. He has yet to go to trial, and his attorney, Michael Oser, said he could not comment on the case.

After the girl reported that she had been attacked, Finland Principal Paul Smathers suspended both the girl and the boy for five days, said Moore, the girl's attorney. School officials told him that "she was suspended because she engaged in the mutually consensual activity on the bus," he said. "But she never said it was consensual."

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jandes@dispatch.com

cboss@dispatch.com