Eilenfeldt ex rel. J.M. v. United C.U.S.D. 304 Board of Education

30 F. Supp. 3d 780, 2014 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 39431
CourtDistrict Court, C.D. Illinois
DecidedMarch 25, 2014
DocketCase No. 4:12-cv-04029-SLD-JEH
StatusPublished
Cited by8 cases

This text of 30 F. Supp. 3d 780 (Eilenfeldt ex rel. J.M. v. United C.U.S.D. 304 Board of Education) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, C.D. Illinois primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Eilenfeldt ex rel. J.M. v. United C.U.S.D. 304 Board of Education, 30 F. Supp. 3d 780, 2014 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 39431 (C.D. Ill. 2014).

Opinion

ORDER

SARA DARROW, UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE

Plaintiff Pamela Eilenfeldt brings this action on behalf of her son J.M., who was continuously bullied and harrassed when, he was in the seventh and eighth grades at United Junior High School in Monmouth, Illinois. Eilenfeldt alleges that Defendants enabled, and, in some instances, encouraged, students to bully and harass J.M. At issue are Defendants’ Motion to Dismiss the Amended Complaint, ECF No. 25, and Defendants’ Motion to Supplement Case Law in Support of Motion to Dismiss First Amended Complaint, ECF No. 30. For the reasons set forth below, Defendants’ Motion to Dismiss is granted in part and denied in part, and the Motion to Supplement Case Law is granted. Counts I and V through VIII are dismissed. The Court grants Eilenfeldt leave to amend her complaint consistent with this Order.

BACKGROUND

At the motion to dismiss stage, well-pleaded facts alleged in the complaint are taken as true and all inferences are drawn in favor of the plaintiff. Tamayo v. Blagojevich, 526 F.3d 1074, 1081 (7th Cir.2008). Accordingly, the Court rests its decision on the following factual allegations:

I. Parties

Eilenfeldt brings this action on behalf of her minor child J.M. against various indi[784]*784viduals and entities associated with the United Community Unit School District #304 (“C.U.S.D.” or “School District”). Eilenfeldt asserts that Defendants acted under color of law and makes her claims against each individual Defendant in his or her individual capacity. Defendants’ identities are as follows:

1. Defendant C.U.S.D. is a political subdivision of the State of Illinois and operates United Junior High School, a public educational institution located in Monmouth, Illinois.
2. Defendant Jeff Whitsitt is the superintendent of schools for the School District.
3. Defendant Kristen Nelson is the principal of United Junior High School.
4. Defendants Ryan Westart, Lori Schrock, and Donna Winbigler are teachers at United Junior High School.
5. Defendant Dennis Brown is a guidance counselor at United Junior .High School.
6. The true names and capacities of Defendants Doe- I-XX1 are unknown to Eilenfeldt. Eilenfeldt is informed and thereon alleges that each Defendant designated as Doe is responsible in some manner for the events referred to in this action and proximately caused J.M.’s injuries.

II. Bullying and Harassment of J.M.

Various students at United Junior High School began bullying and harassing J.M. in January 2011 when he was a seventh-grader. The bullying and harassment continued through the end of that academic year and into the following academic year when J.M. was an eighth grader. During this period, students bullied J.M. by, among other things, taunting, teasing, pushing, punching, and kicking him. Except for one instance of bullying, School District officials and United Junior High School administrators and teachers never investigated complaints that J.M. had been bullied, or punished a student for bullying J.M. To the contrary, administrators and teachers facilitated ongoing bullying of J.M. by failing to stop the bullying, actively encouraging bullying, and punishing J.M. for defending himself while being bullied.

The bullying began in January, 2011 when “TI.,” “P.,” and “Dl.” (presumably other students, though Eilenfeldt does not make this clear) repeatedly shoved J.M. in the hallways and inappropriately touched him in the locker room. Eilenfeldt immediately reported this conduct to three of J.M.’s teachers, Westart, Winbigler, and a Mr. Noonan.2 Despite the report, J.M.’s teachers did not investigate the incidents or punish the students who were involved. When responding to the complaints, Win-bigler said that J.M. “brought some of this on himself.”

These initial incidents were just the beginning of the bullying. Students verbally taunted J.M by calling him a rapist, pedophile, and child molester and suggesting that he was sexually attracted to young boys. In addition to the verbal bullying, students produced pictures, graffiti artwork, and videos depicting J.M. as a pedophile and child molester. Students also continued to physically bully J.M. For instance, students kicked, punched, and [785]*785pushed J.M. One student even threatened to “shank” J.M. with a knife. While the student who threatened to “shank” J.M. was suspended for two weeks, none of the other students who bullied J.M. were punished. Eilenfeldt alleges that when J.M. tried to stand up for himself, J.M. was punished but the bullies were not.

Eilenfeldt continued to report instances of bullying to Nelson and J.M.’s teachers, but almost nothing resulted from these complaints. Instead, they usually blamed J.M. for the bullying. For example, Win-bigler said that J.M. “gives back about as much as he gets” and that he just “needs to stay away from certain kids” and “learn how to make life easier for himself.” In another example, Eilenfeldt complained to Nelson that it was difficult for J.M. to focus on learning because students had been calling him sexually perverted names, repeatedly punching him in the head, and kicking him in the legs. Nelson responded that the bullying was J.M.’s fault and simply assigned him a seat on the school bus.

The bullying and harassment continued into the next school year when J.M. was in the eighth grade. Eilenfeldt continued complaining to school administrators and teachers, but they did not do anything to stop the bullying. Instead, their conduct facilitated more bullying. For example, a Ms. Kopriva gave J.M. detention for telling two bullies that he was not a rapist after those students had called him a rapist in her classroom.

Eventually, in October, 2011, Eilenfeldt spoke with Whitsitt because school administrators and teachers were not doing anything to prevent students from bullying and harassing J.M. But Whitsitt did not take any action to address Eilenfeldt’s complaints. After speaking with Whitsitt, Eilenfeldt met with Nelson and Brown to discuss the ongoing bullying and harassment. One topic of discussion was the school’s punishment of the student who threatened to stab J.M. with a knife. Ei-lenfeldt had two concerns regarding this incident. First, Eilenfeldt was concerned because it was the only instance that the school had punished any student for bullying J.M. Second, the school only punished the student by suspending him for two weeks instead of expelling him for one year and reporting the incident to authorities, both of which are required under the student handbook. Despite these meetings, Whitsitt, Nelson, and Brown took no action to address Eilenfeldt’s concerns.

The bullying and harassment continued after Eilenfeldt met with various school and School District employees. Again, administrators and teachers refrained from punishing the bullies. Instead, they punished J.M. even though he was the one being bullied. In one of Westart’s classes, J.M. tried to defend himself from bullies. Following the altercation, Westart asked the class whether J.M. should be punished by having to write out the preamble to the United States Constitution twenty-five times, and the class agreed to impose the punishment.

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Bluebook (online)
30 F. Supp. 3d 780, 2014 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 39431, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/eilenfeldt-ex-rel-jm-v-united-cusd-304-board-of-education-ilcd-2014.