ANAHEIM : Expelled Publisher Drops His Lawsuit

An Anaheim Hills boy who was forced to leave Canyon High School for distributing a controversial underground newspaper has dropped his lawsuit to re-enroll at the Anaheim school.

Raihan Kadri has agreed to complete his senior year at Troy High School in Fullerton, said his attorney, Jack A. Fleischli.

Facing a lengthy court battle and having already missed 10 days of classes, Kadri decided to drop the suit and prepare for graduation at the other school, Fleischli said.

Kadri, an honor student, was ordered to leave Canyon High last month after handing out 400 copies of “The Exploited,” a six-page newspaper he created that school officials found “slanderous and defamatory.”

Principal Ralph Jameson said Kadri’s newspaper went beyond merely expressing alternative views about campus-related issues, and instead “launched vicious personal attacks against staff and faculty.”

Five school employees were the target of “offensive” cartoon and slanderous descriptions, according to Jameson.

Kadri was denied a restraining order this week by a Superior Court judge. It would have let him return to Canyon High. He said the newspaper was created to offer “new and different ideas” to a student body that had become “repressed and convoluted.”

Kadri wrote an apology to school officials.

After learning of Kadri’s decision to drop the lawsuit, Jameson said he is pleased “because now can move beyond this thing and get back to the work we are here for.”