Jeff Slutzky reports on the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of California’s ruling on Armando Sandoval’s claims against Merced Union High School District starting on page 8 of the June edition of the LGBT Law Association Foundation of Greater New York’s Lesbian/Gay Law Notes.

In the winter of 2005 Armando Sandoval filed two administrative claims for damages against the Merced Union High School District claiming that “he experienced ‘pervasive, severe and unwelcome’ physical and verbal harassment at Merced Union High School based on his gender and sexual orientation, and that the school district and its employees repeatedly and intentionally failed to take adequate measures to stop the harassment.”

Sandoval claimed that he was called “faggot,” “fag,” “queer,” “homo,” and “cocksucker,” that his classmates threatened to assault, injure and kill him, that he was actually assaulted several times on school grounds during and after school, and that the employees of the school district were aware of the harassment but repeatedly failed to take appropriate or necessary measures to stop the abuse.

Among other things, Sandoval claimed that he was assaulted with a knife outside the school cafeteria, received life-threatening notes on his locker, and was suspended from school after defending himself from being spit on and physically attacked on school grounds. He also claimed that school district employees themselves harassed and discriminated against him by preventing him from taking classes in which he was enrolled, suspending him without justification, taking unwarranted disciplinary actions against him, failing to allow him the same privileges as other students, unfairly seeking to have him evaluated as “learning impaired,” and intimidating him, among other actions.

After his claims were denied, Armando decided to sue Merced Union High School District in federal court.

The school district moved to dismiss a cause of action for sex discrimination and their argument was dismissed by the court.

It moved to dismiss one cause of action, for sex discrimination, on the basis that the California Education Code does not provide a private right of action, citing a prior federal court case from California, Nicole M. v. Martinez Unified School District, 964 F. Supp. 1369 (N.D. Cal. 1997). However, the court dismissed this argument, noting that while Nicole M. was based on the 1994 version of the Education Code, the code was amended in 1998. The court stated that under the amended code, the state legislature intended for the provisions on discrimination to be enforceable through a civil action, and therefore a private right was permitted.

Merced Union High School District also asked that several of Armando’s causes of action be dismissed because they did not appear in his original 2005 claims. The court “concluded that most of the allegations contained in the plaintiff’s complaint arose from the same allegations contained in the plaintiff’s claim under the CGTCA.” But there was an exception:

…with regard to one of the paragraphs of the plaintiff’s complaint, the court ruled that the allegations contained therein did not appear in plaintiff’s tort claims. Although the later tort claim was filed on December 27, 2005, the court noted that one sub-paragraph of the complaint alleged events that occurred after that date. The sub-paragraph noted that when Sandoval returned to school in January 2006, harassment continued and the defendants continued to refrain from taking action to prevent it. Here, the court noted, “plaintiff does not merely elaborate or add further detail to his claim, but alleges two entirely distinct factual occurrences which transpired after the filing of the two tort claims.” The court stated that the school district would have had no notice of, and no reason to investigate, acts occurring after the tort claims were filed. Therefore, based on California law, the court ordered the plaintiff to file a First Amended Complaint within 30 days.