JONATHAN MATTISE
Associated Press
CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) — West Virginia’s attorney general says local school officials brushed aside allegations that two middle school boys sexually abused female classmates, and he claims the officials interfered with a state police investigation of the incidents in Mingo County — a community that has been rocked by multiple political scandals in the past year.
Attorney General Patrick Morrisey also claims in a lawsuit that administrators at Burch Middle School retaliated against the girls for reporting the allegations. It says the abuses occurred during the 2012-13 school year and have continued to present.
Defendants include the principal, vice principal, guidance counselor and a coach, the boys and their parents, the Mingo County School Board and superintendent. Names of the boys and their parents were not released. The lawsuit filed Wednesday asks Mingo County Circuit Court to prevent further abuse and retaliation and bar defendants from interfering with the police investigation.
The lawsuit comes less than a year after a former Mingo County judge, prosecutor, magistrate and county commissioner pleaded guilty to charges stemming from a federal corruption probe. The county on the southwestern edge of the state also was rocked in 2013 by the slaying of its sheriff.
The lawsuit says the girls relayed sexual abuse allegations to a guidance counselor in the spring 2012-13 school year — non-consensual fondling, groping and molestation, “oftentimes forcible in nature.”
The victims identified the same two male seventh graders, both of whom are related to Mingo County school system employees. After one alleged incident, the lawsuit says, one boy told the other, “Don’t worry, (your relative) will take care of us.”
The lawsuit alleges the abuse occurred on a school bus, in a school computer lab and on a field trip to Charleston. It describes claims by two girls who were 13 at the time, and it says “additional victims exist.”
Mingo County schools superintendent Randy Keathley told The Associated Press he had not seen the lawsuit yet.
“Once the county has been formally served, we will respond accordingly,” Keathley said Thursday. “Mingo County schools take students’ safety seriously and remain committed to providing a secure environment for all students.”
In one instance, the two boys trapped one of the girls in a bus seat and sexually abused her, the lawsuit claims.
In May 2013, then-principal Jada Hunter told one girl’s mother that “something had happened and not to worry because (Hunter) had taken care of it,” the lawsuit states.
It also alleges:
— During a meeting with the girl’s mother, the principal and a coach, the father of one of the boys said his son admitted to the bus allegations. The coach, Melvin Cunningham, responded that since there were no witnesses, the girl could not prove anything. The principal said the girl could be disciplined for reporting the claims without witnesses.
— The principal advised the girl’s parents not to call police, saying she “would take care of it.” Almost a year later, the parents learned the school had not called the police. The county board of education still has not formally asked for a law enforcement investigation. School officials disciplined the boys by denying them ice cream during a standardized test day and suspending them for one day out of school and one day in school.
— The girls were reprimanded for various school infractions while they or their parents participated in the investigation. This school year, administrators moved one of the girls to seventh grade because one of the boys was in her eighth grade classes. The boy stayed in his age-appropriate classes.
— Burch Middle School principal Melissa Webb told a state trooper investigating the allegations he could no longer take statements from students on April 24 because “it disrupted the learning environment.”
Webb declined to comment Thursday.
The attorney general’s office became involved after receiving a referral from the state Human Rights Commission. Morrisey’s office launched an investigation and reported the claims to the state police, said attorney general spokeswoman Beth Gorczyca Ryan.
State police spokesman Lt. Michael Baylous said the agency’s Crimes Against Children Unit is investigating at least one incident.
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John Raby and Pam Ramsey in Charleston contributed to this report.
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