Parents Sue School After Their Daughters Are Kicked Off Cheerleading Squaed Over Nude Photos

• December 5, 2008

Because their daughters were denied “due process.”

The parents of two Seattle-area high school cheerleaders are suing the district for suspending the girls from the squad after nude photographs of them circulated via text message.
The two teens were suspended from the squad — one for 30 days and one for the entire year — after school officials learned of the photos in August, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer reported.
The families suing Northshore School District weren’t identified because the girls are minors.
The lawsuits, filed on Nov. 17, say the district violated the girls’ due process rights, according to the paper. The families allege it was unnecessary for school officials to share the photos with other staff members, and claim they were negligent in failing to report the matter to police as a potential case of child pornography.
Matthew King, the attorney representing the families, told the Post-Intelligencer that it was unfair to punish the cheerleaders but not the other students who received or forwarded the photos.
“We’re not technically challenging the sanctions as being too strict, we’re saying they weren’t evenly enforced across the school,” said King. “There should have been some punishment meted out to those who were in possession of the photos. … It seems like the girls are getting the brunt of it.”
One of the pictures was taken three years ago and sent to the teen’s then-boyfriend. The other was snapped in June. The lawsuits allege that the girls believed they had deleted the photos, but accidentally sent them to members of the football team.

As a parent, I can tell you that a lawsuit certainly wouldn’t be my reaction to this situation. “Accidentally sent them to the football team.”
Yeah. Right.
Due process, as provided for by the 5th amendment, simply means that nobody can be denied life or liberty without first being afforded some sort of hearing. Frankly, I don’t think being booted from the cheerleading squad is equivalent to denying anyone life or liberty. Cheerleading for a school is, after all, a privilege and not a right. Using this lawyer’s reasoning, nobody could be cut from the cheerleading team without some sort of school or court hearing.
Also for the accusations of child pornography, I think it’s a bit dangerous to invoke statutes intended to protect children from pederasty in a situation that has seventeen-year-old girls sending out pictures of themselves (inadvertently or otherwise) to other people their own age. I think you could make a case for the school needing to punish the other kids who helped distribute these photos – fair is fair – but outside of that I don’t see where the school district did anything wrong.
There was a time in this country when a situation like this would have prompted shame, embarrassment and an effort from the parents to reform their wayward daughters. These days it prompts lawsuits and finger pointing.
Sad.

Tags: Domestic Issues, Politics

http://Array 11B40

Greetings:

I think my father’s reaction would have been, “We’re both going to the hospital; you to get your butt fixed and me to get my boot back.”
http://SayAnythingBlog.com The_Whistler_ofnd

This is a career building opportunity.

I think we just figured out how they’re going to pay for college.
http://SayAnythingBlog.com The_Whistler_ofnd

In our school the kids would be kicked out of the band (or any other extracurricular activity) for doing this. It’s not just jocks and cheerleaders who are expected to behave.

I don’t know what else the schools supposed to do. Kicking them out of school doesn’t seem like it’s going to be productive.

On the other hand I think Hawk has a good point. If the event took place completely off of school grounds then why is it any of the schools business?
magicfox

Okay so we are holding different standards for highschool girls then Hollywood? Wasn’t that star in Highschool musical busted for the same thing, except her pictures were on the internet!
How do we expect our kids to learn right from wrong, respect and disrespect when we do not hold Hollywood to certain standards as well!?! Videogames, movies, t.v. magazines ect all have adult content for anyone over age of 10.
You can’t sheild your children; but you should hold them accountable for their actions and teach them certain things will not be tolerated and if that doesn’t work, then the consequences will be on their shoulders(this should included the football players that got the pictures then sent them around, I mean come on! What type of real BF would do that to you?).
Hold your head up girls, you did a common mistake that most younger woman make, but understand that what your parents are teaching you is wrong. You cannot go through life and expect to blame someone else everytime you make a mistake, nor can any attorney always bail you out of trouble. Learn from this, put your trust in yourself and if a guy says that he loves you, he would respect your body and your decisions as well.
To the football players, I hope your school will look at what you have done and are doing to these girls as well as make you accountable for some of the problems, and if not the school hopefully your parents will!
di butler

Justin you “nailed it.” And you probably could the cheerleaders, too.
AndyinPhoenix

I’m fairly certain if the school prosecuted the Child Porn angle (ie tag the picture-passers with a life-time felon rap) the students, at this school and across the nation, will change their behavior as fast as a viral Youtube. Draconian, maybe, but it seems a law was violated.

Let it fall on the aggrieved parents to drop the charges.
Failing to prosecute sends the message that this behavior is OK
syn

When talking children I don’t believe it’s just nudity and parents who protect such things are sick. Most probably really ugly, living their empty lives vicariously through their children…but mostly sick.
di butler

Why does it fall on the school to be punished if it is your child who is the one acting like a whore? There is a catalyst to this story, the girls, if they hadn’t taken their tops off, if they hadn’t thought it was cute to take pics of their boobs, if they hadn’t thought it would be fun to send to the boyfriends, then nothing further would have happened. You really think it’s the boy’s fault for spreading them around? Why? They are teenagers, they were sent to them, they didn’t take them, so, of course they are going to show them off. If the school doesn’t want to be seen as condoning this behavior then the girls, supposed role models for the school, should be prepared to get what is coming to them. Then they won’t do it again, hopefully, and maybe others will think twice. By suing the school or whomever they are sending the message that the girls bear no responsibility for their actions. Victim mode. This is the worst possible way to raise your children. So, what if the girls take fron this, every time I screw up someone will bail me out, or they just assume that the world is out to get them, they are always doing right, just geing persecuted. Sorry, I respectfully don’t think you know teenagers very well.
Jackass Jimmy

Ah but these finger-pointers and lawsuit-filers are the ones who *want* the entitlist society we live in these days… therefore, vote for those offering the greatest gifts funded by the public largess.

Shame?

Indeed.
Chuck

If I were that father I would sue the school administrators and that would only be the start. I would sick the best investigator I could on them and their families and then publish every little bit of dirt he uncovered.

I may not be happy about the pictures, but I’m intelligent enough to know 17 year olds and I would be damned to hell before I would let some self-righteous clown of a school administrator punish my child and think that he could get away with it.
jpgr

My God whistler, I was thinking the same thing.
Seriously

Soooo… these girls should be punished for their “immoral” behavior? Are all girls AND boys who are involved in extra-curricular events or clubs and found to be doing something “immoral” like having sex, or smoking, or drinking, or looking at porn, etc, etc, ALSO going to be suspended?

Give me a freakin break.

This is NONE of the schools business, period. It did not take place on school grounds. 17 year old “girls” are really young women. They can take care of themselves, they don’t need the school system to babysit their personal lives.

If it was a “purity club” then they should get booted out of the club (not school). In this case NO action was appropriate.

This is a victim-less crime and I, for one, would sue the pants off the school. THEN who would be naked, huh?
http://insanereindeer.blogspot.com/ Kenny

Okay so we are holding different standards for highschool girls then Hollywood? Wasn’t that star in Highschool musical busted for the same thing, except her pictures were on the internet!

Unfortunately, the situation we see here is what would happen in Hollywood. There was talk of punishing Hudgins, then a lawyer got involved…and 2 more sequels were made with her in them.

We should not use bad examples by famous people to justify bad actions of everyday Joes.

The idea that we should hold jocks and cheerleaders to higher standards and that they are role models is a sad commentary on our society. While being physically active is a good thing, there is nothing inherantly in playing sports that makes one a better person than say somebody who diligently studies science or plays chess or writes poetry etc.

Not really. In any school activity there are different standards than there are for the general populous. You have to keep your grades higher, you have to have better attendance, you have to have good behavior.

For any normal student, they can skip school and yet go to the football game or play or debate, but if the debater, football player or actor skips school, they’re out for the night (and maybe longer).

These students are the face of the school. They are its public representatives and they are expected to act as such. This doesn’t mean that they are “better people”.

Counter example: Nancy Pelosi is not better than, well, anyone. She’s pretty low on the decency scale. But as an elected official she is subject to rules that normal people aren’t. We can all accept a gift from whomever we want…she can’t. We can spend our own money on lunch. She can’t. Is it because she’s a “better person”? Hardly. It’s because she is in a different position than us.

They didn’t break the law or any school rules I am aware of. If their parents want to punish them fine, but I am not sure why the school should.

The article seems to say that the pictures were being shared at school. Like it or not, that makes it school business.

I don’t know what else the schools supposed to do. Kicking them out of school doesn’t seem like it’s going to be productive.

And despite the parent’s whining…I don’t think they really want their children to be reported for child pornography (because they’d take the heat…since they took the pics).
pparets

Seriously said…

This is NONE of the schools business, period. It did not take place on school grounds.

That was the exact argument used by the parents of Dylan Kliebold and Eric Harris when Columbine School officials initially raised concerns about their off-campus conduct.

If Seriously thinks that schools do not have a legitimate right to respond to inappropriate student behavior – wherever it occurs – then Seriously is in serious conflict with numerous rulings by the federal courts and plain old common sense.

Underaged students – regardless of their age – have no business distributing nude photos of themselves or others. They knew from the get-go that what they were doing was wrong. Being a high school cheerleader, athlete or bandmember is a privilege, not a right, and inappropriate behave results in consequences. That’s how life itself
works.
JD

“Parents Sue School After Their Daughters Are Kicked Off Cheerleading Squaed Over Nude Photos”
Squaed or squad? I think you mean squad there.
http://SayAnythingBlog.com The_Whistler_ofnd

Due to the age of the parties I will refrain from stating that “this thread is useless without pictures.”
Hawk

We should hold Jocks and Cheerleaders to a high standard of ethical behavior. I think the school did the right thing, and the parents are absolutely doing the wrong thing.

The idea that we should hold jocks and cheerleaders to higher standards and that they are role models is a sad commentary on our society. While being physically active is a good thing, there is nothing inherantly in playing sports that makes one a better person than say somebody who diligently studies science or plays chess or writes poetry etc.

These are typical adolecents and it is not fair to put the added pressure of being role models to the rest of the school on them.

They didn’t break the law or any school rules I am aware of. If their parents want to punish them fine, but I am not sure why the school should.
http://www.bikebubba.blogspot.com/ Bike Bubba

The reason schools punish this is historic; under the doctrine of in loco parentis, schools assume some responsibility for the moral development of their students. It’s the same reason that parents ought to be thanking, not suing, the school for reminding their children that some things are just plain tacky.
http://christyscoffeebreak.blogspot.com/ Christy

I’m the mother of a cheerleader and I would be punishing her not suing the school. You’d think that the parents would have the decency to be embarrassed. Since they obviously are lacking in parenting skills here’s a hint..take away the girls cell phones until they are mature enough not to sex text people.
pparets

Chuck demonstrates why he is the model moron American parent: “Ain’t no one gonna punish MY kid… I gonna get ME a lawyer and I be sueing!”

I would be damned to hell before I would let some self-righteous clown of a school administrator punish my child and think that he could get away with it.

…. all of which helps to explain why we are raising a generation of pampered, vulgar, arrogant, rude, ignorant, sex-obsessed kids.

“I can do whatever I want! Mommy and Daddy said so!”
di butler

I was a cheerleader, yes, I know that was a million years ago, and my daughter was a cheerleader, and it was understood you were to hold yourself to a higher standard in order to be on the squad. All that said, they didn’t accidently do squat. They didn’t accidentally stick their boobs in front of the camera and accidentally click the shutter, then accidentally send to the BF. Girls do this all the time in school these days. And they knew they would get passed around. They didn’t care, until they got caught. The parents are saying, “It’s o.k. you acted like a little whore, mommy and daddy will fix it.” Lovely. They should grow up to be real nice ladies with excellent character.
http://www.ski-blog.com/ sayanything-24

Mom, Dad…

Invest in some strobe lights and a pole. These girls are not shy and have either dance or acrobatic skills.

This is a career building opportunity.
http://www.bikebubba.blogspot.com/ Bike Bubba

Magicfox, I think that the point being made is that if you embarass your school by what you do, you forfeit your right to represent that school on the cheerleading squad.

Never mind the little fact that when a young lady becomes known as such a tramp, it gets a lot more difficult to keep her SAFE at games, if you catch my drift. These rules aren’t just arbitrary.

And yes, I do hope that Dizzy (oops, Disney) and her agent and family had some serious talks with Miss Hudgens about her behavior, as she stands to suffer a lot for what she’s done as well.
http://rustyferguson.com/ Rusty

Chuck, good for you.

Its just nudity. Big Freaking Deal.
http://insanereindeer.blogspot.com/ Kenny

If I were that father I would sue the school administrators and that would only be the start. I would sick the best investigator I could on them and their families and then publish every little bit of dirt he uncovered.

Well, then not only are you a terrible parent, you’re not much of a human being now are you?

Your response to your daughter making herself a laughing stock at school would be to try and ruin the lives of the administrators who have to respond to the misdeeds of your child? What’s wrong with you?

PParets comment doesn’t do it justice.
Wing Chun Geologist

Cheerleaders, football players, student government officers are serve two purposes.

1. They are embasadors for the school.

2. They are role models for other students.

We should hold Jocks and Cheerleaders to a high standard of ethical behavior. I think the school did the right thing, and the parents are absolutely doing the wrong thing.
Mickey

Mom, Dad…

Invest in some strobe lights and a pole. These girls are not shy and have either dance or acrobatic skills.

This is a career building opportunity.

Keep those cheerleading outfits; they could be tax deductible as a business expense.

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Parents Sue School After Their Daughters Are Kicked Off Cheerleading Squaed Over Nude Photos

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