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Safety Law News for September 15, 2022

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— In Pennsylvania, the United States District Court refused to dismiss the lawsuit of a student who created at his home a computer-generated, tournament-style bracket that reflected voting by himself and a few friends regarding 64 girls, mostly classmates, to determine the two most liked or admired girls.  Months later, another student discovered the activity on the Internet and disseminated it publicly.  School discipline consisted of a written apology by the student who created the activity and punishment in the form of excluding him from speaking at the graduation ceremony.  The court held that school officials may punish or censor student speech without offending the First Amendment when (1) the speech that is vulgar, lewd, or threatening; (2) the speech is related to the school curriculum; (3) when the speech would materially and substantially disrupt classwork and discipline in the school, or invade the rights of others.  The court ruled that the off-campus speech was protected because it was not intended to harm, harass, or objectify anyone and was expected to remain private.  The school discipline in revoking the position of the student as a speaker at graduation violated the First Amendment.  Wang v Bethlehem Central School District

— In Congress, the Securing Our Schools Act of 2022 has been introduced.  Under the provisions of the legislation, $15 billion is provided to double the number of school resource officers, $10 billion to hire 15,000 mental health professionals for middle and high schools and $2.56 billion for physical security improvements on school campuses.

— In Ohio, police officers from the Cincinnati Police Department will remain in the public schools.  The Cincinnati Public Schools Board of Education voted to continue using school resource officers.  The five-year contract outlines protocols for discipline, training, and policies.  A member of the school board says of this decision, “we have some excellent SROs who are wonderful people dedicated to youth and preventing crime.”

— In Florida, a recent grand jury report found Duval County Public Schools officials failed to report over 2,000 crimes.  A 2020 grand jury preliminary report first sounded the alarm, citing the district for underreporting crime statistics and gang activity.

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Safety Law News for September 9, 2022

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— In Michigan, the United States District Court upheld the school discipline of a ten (10) day suspension to a student for posting to a fake Instagram account that he created off-campus impersonating a teacher, sharing the username and password with other students, and targeting other teachers with subsequent posts.  Applying the recent off-school speech case of Mahanoy Area School District v. B.L. ex rel. Levy, 141 S.Ct. 2038 (2021), the court “balanced the school’s interest in disciplining a student’s speech against the off-campus features of his speech and then addressed the ‘material disruption’ prong of Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School District, 393 U.S. 503 (1969).”  The school discipline was valid because the Instagram account impersonated one teacher and targeted others teachers, qualifying as “serious or severe bullying or harassment,” giving the school a significant interest in disciplining the speech that “interfered with the work and discipline of the school.”  Kutchinski v Freeland Community School District

— In Arkansas, the Arkansas School Safety Commission is launching an anonymous tip line to report safety threats.  The tip line is one of several recommendations submitted to the Governor in a Report on protecting school students.  Other recommendations focus on areas such as mental health and prevention, law enforcement and security, audits, emergency operations plans and drills, physical safety, and intelligence and communication.

— In New York, officials in New York City are making school safety a priority.  Over 200 school safety agents will patrol schools.  The buildings were checked for working door locks, alarms, panic buttons, and operable public announcing systems.  School personnel are receiving training on active shooter procedures in coordination with law enforcement.

— In the United States, parents who are concerned for their children’s safety at school is at the highest level in over two decades.  According to Gallup, 44% of parents said they fear for their child’s physical safety while at school, compared with 34% of parents in the previous survey.

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Safety Law News for September 1, 2022

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— In Mississippi, the Court of Appeals of Mississippi reversed a ruling in favor of a student who was injured at school, playing tag as he waited on his school bus.  The court reversed the lower court because even though state law imposes on schools “a ministerial duty to use ordinary care and to take reasonable steps to minimize foreseeable risks to students thereby providing a safe school environment,…there was no a proximate causal connection between the inadequacy or lack of supervision and the accident.”  Proximate cause requires a finding that the negligence of a school be both the cause in fact and the legal cause of the injury to the student.  Here, the court reversed, declaring that “(the student’s) injury happened suddenly and accidently. Further, (the student’s) injury could not have been foreseen even if more supervision had been present.”  Simpson County School District v Wigley

— In Virginia, the General Assembly approved an additional $45 million over two fiscal years for school safety to pay for new school resource officers and school security officers.  The funding will support 185 positions across 182 schools, including 110 elementary schools, 24 middle schools and 31 high schools.  The top priority will be filling positions at middle and high schools.

— In Arkansas, the legislature enacted a grant program that provides $50 million for school safety.  The Arkansas School Safety Commission, whose report provided guidance for the legislation, will continue assessing school safety in the state.  The Arkansas Criminal Justice Institute and the Arkansas Department of Education will develop rules for the grant.

— In California, officials in the Oakland Unified School District remain resolved to exclude police from their campuses after the shooting of a 13-year-old by a 12-year-old student at a middle school.  Oakland City Councilmembers are divided on whether or not a police presence at schools is a good idea.

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Safety Law News for August 30, 2022

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— In Maryland, the Court of Appeals of Maryland affirmed the denial of a student’s suppression motion involving the search of a backpack and cell phone.  After a school resource officer broke up a fight in which the student was involved, the student’s backpack dropped from his body to the ground. The officer and student reached for the backpack simultaneously; the officer picked it up first. The student then ran from the scene. The officer opened the backpack, finding a firearm, three cell phones, and the student’s school ID card.  The court ruled that the warrantless search of the backpack was permissible because it was abandoned.  The court also ruled that the officers reasonably relied on the warrant in executing the search of the cell phones.  Richardson v. Johnson.

— In Indiana, state officials have approved nearly $23 million in grants to fund school security.  The grants are awarded each year to help districts pay for school resource officers and upgrades like new equipment. This year, 425 schools have been approved to receive these funds.

— In Massachusetts, parents in the Framingham School District are requesting greater transparency in the implementation of the new school security plan.  Under the new agreement with police, city officials promised to (1) alert the community about the details of the agreement, (2) set up a process for submitting complaints about school resource officers, (3) provide data school discipline and arrests, and (4) budget data on the cost of implementation of the agreement.

— In Colorado, educators in the Denver Public Schools are showing returning students a video that recommends that students refrain from reporting campus incidents to police.  The video, which focuses on de-escalation of conflicts involving students, includes a series of recommendations.  One of the tips says to avoid the police because police can escalate, and “often treat victims as perpetrators of crimes.”

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Safety Law News for August 25, 2022

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— In California, the United States District Court refused to dismiss claims of excessive force asserted against two school resource officers who fought with a student while attempting to escort him to the administrative office.  The officers flipped the student from his back onto his stomach, handcuffed him, and took him to the administrative office.  According to one of the officers, “(y)ou turned around and you fronted me like you were going to fight me.”  The court ruled that the elements of excessive force include, “(1) the severity of the crime at issue, (2) whether the suspect poses an immediate threat to the safety of the officers or others, and (3) whether he is actively resisting arrest or attempting to evade arrest by flight.”  The court ruled that a reasonable jury could conclude that SROs’ use of force was unjustified.  “(The student) was a thirteen-year-old freshman, almost a foot shorter and 100 pounds lighter …He held a sweater in his hands, while both SRO(s) were armed and in uniform. At all times, (the student) was surrounded by numerous adults, including the SROs and …was walking toward the administrative office in compliance … even though no fight had taken place.”  Silvas v County of Riverside, EDCV192358JGBSHKX, 2022 WL 3574176 (CD Cal July 14, 2022)

— In Idaho, the school resource officers of the Cassia County School District will begin wearing rifle rated body armor.  The body armor, a gift from a fundraiser for school safety, “will handle AR 15 rounds, and even AK 47 rounds.”

— In Kentucky, all public schools are required to have a school resource officer at each school campus.  However, the mandate is unfunded.  As a result, schools are struggling to meet the requirement.

— In Pennsylvania, a comprehensive school safety plan was presented by the Philadelphia School District that creates 27 zones, around high violence middle and high schools, where uniformed officers will be present to help students leave school safely during dismissal.

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Safety Law News for August 16, 2022

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— In Louisiana, the Court of Appeal of Louisiana affirmed the dismissal of a lawsuit brought by parents of a child who fell on the playground during recess and broke his leg.  The court agreed that educators “owe a duty of reasonable supervision over students. The supervision required is reasonable, competent supervision appropriate to the age of the children and the attendant circumstances.”  But the court ruled that the parents’ allegation that educators were negligent in their supervision of students during recess must fail because the injury to their child “was neither foreseeable nor preventable absent constant supervision….(and) constant supervision of all students is not possible nor required for educators to discharge their duty to provide adequate supervision.”  Hernandez v Livingston Parish School Board

— In California, officials in the Shasta County School District are increasing safety this upcoming school year in the light of the Uvalde, Texas incident.  Working closely with local law enforcement, educators are looking to improve perimeter safety and threat assessments. They plan to install a new text notification system and bring juvenile probation officers on campus.

— In Texas, as schools begin the fall semester, superintendents say they haven’t seen the $100 million in funding for school safety promised by the state.  Half of the funding is earmarked for providing bullet-resistant shields. Another portion is designated for silent panic alert technology, while smaller portions are to go toward increasing mental health resources for students.

— In Michigan, the Office of School Safety is reporting that more students reached out to a confidential tip line in 2021 to report threats, violent behavior or mental health crises. Up 67% from 2020, the five main categories were “Planned School Attack,” Threats, Bullying, Suicides threats, and “Other” (e.g., anxiety, stress, depression, harassment).