Officials at a school in Maine secretly gave a 13-year-old girl a tool to compress her breasts and began calling the girl a boy without letting the girl’s mother know, according to a new lawsuit.
The mother, Amber Lavigne, didn’t learn of the secret transition until she found a chest binder in her daughter’s room one day.
Roy also allegedly told the girl, identified as A.B. in the complaint, that he wouldn’t inform her parents and that she didn’t need to let them know.
Chest binders are are commonly used by girls seeking to become known as boys. Side effects include back pain and trouble breathing.
Lavigne later learned that Roy and other school officials, including social worker Jessica Berk, had been calling her daughter by a different name and using different gender pronouns.
“Plaintiff is informed and believes, and on that basis alleges, that Defendants Roy and Berk chose, at A.B’s request, to use a different name and pronouns when speaking to or about A.B., and that other officials at the school, including some teachers, did so afterwards. At no time, however, did any Defendant or any other school official inform Plaintiff of these facts,” the suit states.
The school’s 5-page transgender student policy says that a student “will be considered transgender if, at school, he/she consistently asserts a gender identity or expression different from the gender assigned at birth.”
Under the policy, a student who professes to be transgender should contact his or her guidance counselor or another official and a plan should be developed by the school, in consultation with the student and the student’s parents, to “address the student’s particular needs.”
A student who wants to be called by a name that isn’t his or her birth name and identified with pronouns that don’t correspond with his or her birth sex should be referred to by the name and pronouns he or she desires, according to the policy, and the student should be able to use restrooms corresponding to his or her identified gender.
Meetings
After finding the chest binder, Lavigne met with the school’s principal, Kim Schaff, and the county superintendent, Lynsey Johnston.Lavigne says the officials expressed concern about the information being withheld from her, but in a second meeting, they claimed that no policies had been violated.
Lavigne says she withdrew her daughter from the school as a result of what happened.
Just days later, agents with the Maine Office of Child and Family Services visited her home, saying they'd been tipped off about alleged emotional abuse by her against her daughter.
An investigation didn’t substantiate the claim.
The defendants didn’t respond to The Epoch Times’ requests for comment.
The Great Salt Bay Community School Board has said in a statement that all students have a “right to privacy regardless of age“ and that it has an ”obligation to maintain the confidentiality of student and employee information.” In another statement, the board said that giving the minor girl a chest binder and transitioning her without parental input didn’t violate any policy or law.
The school’s policy forbids asking a student to keep a secret.
Violation
The actions by school officials violated the constitutional rights of Lavigne bestowed by the 14th Amendment, according to the suit.“Plaintiff has a fundamental constitutional right to control and direct the care, custody, education, upbringing, and healthcare decisions of her children,” it states. “By withholding and concealing vital information about her minor child’s asserted gender identity—information any conscientious parent has a compelling interest in knowing—Defendants effectively rendered it impossible for Plaintiff to exercise that fundamental constitutional right.
“For example, by withholding and concealing information from Plaintiff, Defendants left Plaintiff without the ability to choose how to advise A.B. with respect to the risks and benefits of wearing a chest binder, or the potential future consequences of employing an alternate name and pronouns.”
The defendants didn’t have any basis for withholding the information because Lavigne had never given them cause to believe that A.B. would be harmed by her, the suit says.
Lavigne is asking the court to enter a judgment against the defendants for constitutional violations, nominal damages of $1, and actual damages for the amount she’s incurred as a result of both removing her daughter from school and attorney fees. She is also seeking an injunction to stop the defendants from calling any of her children by different names or pronouns without express consent from her.
Lavigne is being represented by attorneys with the Goldwater Institute.
“The Supreme Court has repeatedly held, over the last century, that parents have a fundamental right to control and direct the education, upbringing, and healthcare decisions of their children,” Adam Shelton, lead attorney on the case, said in a statement. “But parents cannot meaningfully exercise this right if public schools hide vital information about their children from them—which is exactly what the Great Salt Bay Community School did to Ms. Lavigne.”
