Georgia college students sue over blocked protest against rebel flag

ATLANTA (AP) — Several Black college students who were suspended for trying to protest Confederate flag displays at their college in Georgia have filed a federal lawsuit in opposition to their college district and its board members, accusing them of allowing an intensive pattern of racism together with “overt bigotry and animosity by some white students and academics against African American students.”

The students, joined by their moms as plaintiffs, already made news when their protest at Coosa High College was stifled last fall.

Now, in their lawsuit filed Tuesday against the Floyd County faculty district and its board members, they allege an intensive sample of racism, together with white students reenacting the murder of George Floyd and posting it on social media, and a pupil who carried what appeared to be a whip and instructed a Black scholar “we used to whip you.”

They also allege unfair punishment: Students are banned from wearing Black Lives Matter shirts, however Confederate flag apparel is suitable below the school’s costume code, the lawsuit says.

The go well with faults administrators for “deliberate indifference to acts of racial animosity toward black college students perpetrated by white college students and lecturers; in addition to the school’s viewpoint discrimination in its dress code and the inconsistent administration of disciplinary insurance policies to the detriment of Black students.”

Becoming a member of the scholars as plaintiffs are their moms, Lekisha Turner and Jessica Murray. Murray claims she was pulled over by a police officer after selecting up the suspended children, and detained till school officers introduced her with a letter threatening felony trespassing prices if she was discovered again on school grounds.

Superintendent Glenn White on Tuesday said the district disputes the allegations however had been advised by legal professionals to not get into specifics at the moment. “The Floyd County faculty system seems to be forward to presenting the information on this situation in courtroom,” White told The Associated Press in a cellphone interview.

Coosa Excessive near Rome is in the heart of northwest Georgia’s conservative 14th Congressional District, which despatched Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene to Congress. About 10% of the school’s more than 800 college students in grades 8-12 are Black, state enrollment figures present. About 58% are white, while 26% are Hispanic and the the rest are multiracial or another race.

The lawsuit accuses faculty officials of creating “an atmosphere the place certain viewpoints together with white nationalism and white supremacy are permitted however speech of an ideologically totally different viewpoint is expressly prohibited.”

When a group of students sought to protest the flexibility of their classmates to put on the Accomplice flag on campus, the principal threatened student Deserae Turner that she may very well be jailed for “instigating a riot,” the lawsuit says. The principal additionally introduced over the intercom that any scholar protesting and even possessing a flyer saying the protest can be disciplined.

The lawsuit alleges that 4 Black plaintiffs who organized the protest had been suspended for five days, while nonblack pupil organizers were not disciplined. Lawyers additionally allege the preemptive shutdown of the protest and calls for that students not submit on social media violated college students’ First Modification rights. A fifth student who was not suspended has additionally sued.

The suit says gown code guidelines permitting Accomplice flag apparel however not Black Lives Matter apparel are illegal viewpoint discrimination by a government company, which additionally violates the First Amendment. It says the district additionally has violated the scholars’ and fogeys’ right to equal safety underneath the 14th Modification, in addition to the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

Amongst different remedies, the plaintiffs demand that the school district be blocked from additional punishing the scholars because of their speech, take away prior punishments from faculty data and pay money damages.

Among the many attorneys bringing the go well with is Shannon Liss-Riordan, a lawyer searching for the Democratic nomination for lawyer common in Massachusetts.

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Follow Jeff Amy on Twitter at http://twitter.com/jeffamy.