A Moral Lapse for the LAUSD

There are defining moments that demonstrate just how far removed entrenched school district bureaucracies and campus leaders can be from looking out for the best interests of the children entrusted to their care. For the Los Angeles Unified School District and its legal piranhas, that moment comes in the form of the case of a 59th Street School student in Hyde Park. As an 8-year-old in April 1994, he was molested at the school by an 11-year-old fellow student who should never have been placed in a regular school setting.

Then the boy was abused again by the LAUSD in its win-at-any-cost defense strategy during a civil lawsuit brought by the victim’s mother. The depths to which this strategy sunk would have been appalling had it been pursued against an adult. That it was pressed against a child is reprehensible.

The assailant came to 59th Street School in 1993 from Arkansas. Before that, he had been hospitalized in mental institutions at least three times after physically lashing out at teachers, students and his foster mother.

Arkansas officials say the school records transferred to the LAUSD included the observation that the boy “appears to be obsessed with sexuality.” Even if the LAUSD is correct in saying it received only part of those records, officials here had ample evidence of their own. The older boy was physically abusive to students and a behavioral problem almost from the start. Moreover, he had been accused of an earlier sexual attack on another student. But no action was taken beyond principal Harry Stovall advising his staff to tell students to escort the boy when he was outside the classroom and asking playground aides to watch school restrooms.

When the victim’s mother, who always walked her child to school to keep him safe, finally filed a lawsuit, the district’s legal team went beyond the pale. Its defense hinted that the molestation might have been “exciting and thrilling” to the victim. It scoffed at the idea that an 8-year-old might have been too intimidated to cry out for help. It took pains to portray the victim as a boy who preferred to play so-called girls’ games.

The jury in the civil trial responded properly. It slammed the LAUSD with one of the highest damage awards ever for student-on-student violence. We have another suggestion. The principal of the school, and those primarily responsible for the district’s legal defense in this case, ought to find a new line of work.