An Oklahoma parent is suing the local school district, alleging her 15-year-old daughter was “attacked” in the girls’ bathroom at a high school and was “severely beaten” by a 17-year-old male who identifies as a transgender student.
The lawsuit was filed in the District Court of Oklahoma County on May 25 against the Edmond Public Schools aka Independent School District No. 12 of Oklahoma County. The alleged incident took place at Edmond Memorial High School on Oct. 26, 2022.
According to court documents, the parent is seeking $75,000 plus court costs and attorney’s fees for “severe physical and mental injuries, severe physical, and mental pain and suffering, and severe emotional distress.”
The lawsuit also mentions Gov. Kevin Stitt’s signing of SB 615 into law on May 25, 2022. That law requires students at Oklahoma public schools to use restrooms that match the sex listed on their birth certificates. “Defendant’s negligent failure or refusal to comply with Okla. Stat. tit. 70, 1-25, resulted in Plaintiff’s injuries and damages,” the complaint argues.
The district “never notified the girl’s mother about the incident or that a male transgender student was using the girls’ bathroom” at the high school, the lawsuit said.
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According to the complaint, at the time of the alleged assault, the district knew the transgender student was a biological male that identified as a female and knew the transgender student regularly used the girls’ bathroom.
The lawsuit said the male transgender student made “previous threats of violence” against the teenage girl identified as E.G. It also said on Oct. 21, the school had “Edmond Police remove the transgender student from the girls’ bathroom and search him for a weapon after his threats against E.G. were reported by another student.
According to the police report of the alleged assault obtained by Fox News Digital, the transgender student entered the restroom and spoke to a female student. The two began arguing and a fight broke out.
The report said the transgender student became angry after the female student didn’t want to talk with her and asked her if she “wanted to fight” before hitting her in the face. The alleged attacker reportedly continued to hit, kick and pull the female student’s hair.
The report said officers observed one victim had injuries to her “eye, face and head with a possible concussion,” according to Fox News.
The outlet states the fight was witnessed by several of E.G.’s friends. One friend told police they tried to help, but they were also struck in the face twice.
Edmond Public Schools Superintendent Angela Grunewald addressed the incident in a short video posted to YouTube on Dec. 16, 2022.
“You may ask yourself how can that happen?” Grunewald said. “It’s hard to explain, but if a parent comes in and enrolls their child as a certain gender, and when you look at that child by all social norms they look and present themselves as that gender, it’s not something that you would question. Also in high school, birth certificates are not required to start school. So there was no birth certificate in the (student’s) file at the time to verify one way or another.”
“We had two policies broken at this time,” the superintendent said. “One, we have a policy against fighting. And we have a policy that our school board enacted in August of this school year that says all students must go to the bathroom of their birth gender, and both of those policies were broken. And both of them have consequences. I can tell you consequences were given for both violations.”
The superintendent didn’t mention what the consequences were but said the transgender student was no longer enrolled at the high school.
CBN News reached out to Edmond Public Schools for additional comment. In an emailed statement, Susan Parks-Schlepp, director of communications for the school district, said, “Because this matter is in litigation, there is little that can be said at this time. However, Edmond Public Schools is confident that when the facts are presented, it will be determined that the district fully complied with the law and acted in a reasonable manner.”
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