A former student has sued Regis St. Mary Catholic School for alleged racial harassment, claiming the school failed to prevent verbal and physical abuse by classmates.
The student, represented by guardian ad litem Stephanie Pileggi, is seeking $750,000 in Marion County Circuit Court for incidents starting in April of 2022 when the student was in 5th grade.
The school, as well as co-defendant Archdiocese of Portland, has denied wrongdoing and asked for the claims to be dismissed.
A hearing to set a trial date is scheduled for March 13 before Judge James Edmonds.
According to the suit, originally filed Sept. 19, 2023, plaintiff was the only African American in the middle school program. Because of his skin color, the suit claims multiple students targeted him including incidents of:
• Alleged repeated physical harassment causing bruises and marks.
• Alleged repeated use of the n-word, with one student allegedly telling plaintiff they would “shoot his house” after the harassment was reported.
• Plaintiff allegedly being teased about whether or not he liked fried chicken, watermelon and grape Kool-Aid.
• Students allegedly making false claims of wrongdoing against plaintiff to have him suspended from playing basketball.
Additionally the suit claims one teacher allegedly would group plaintiff for assignments with students known to harass him and denied his requests to be moved to another group.
The same teacher allegedly ignored his Independent Education Program (IEP) for ADHD and anxiety, and punished him for using a Chromebook and fidget device allowed by the IEP. This included allegedly making plaintiff sit in the hall where he would encounter harassment by other students, and in one alleged incident striking him while forcibly taking the Chromebook.
The suit claims school staff and administrators were made aware of these incidents and allegedly ignored or minimized the harassment, or implied plaintiff had provoked the harassment.
In April of 2023 he was disenrolled from Regis by his parents “as a result of the continued racism, harassment, bullying, and assaults,” said the suit.
Regis denied the allegations in a Dec. 20, 2023, court filing and said any harm suffered by plaintiff was not the result of the school’s actions or inactions. The school acknowledged it responded to 13 separate incidents involving plaintiff in 2022 and 2023 and said these were all “promptly addressed.”
