Georgia college students sue over blocked protest against rebel flag

ATLANTA (AP) — Several Black college students who had been suspended for attempting to protest Accomplice flag shows at their college in Georgia have filed a federal lawsuit against their faculty district and its board members, accusing them of permitting an intensive sample of racism together with “overt bigotry and animosity by some white college students and lecturers towards African American students.”

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

Now, in their lawsuit filed Tuesday towards the Floyd County school district and its board members, they allege an intensive pattern of racism, including white students reenacting the homicide of George Floyd and posting it on social media, and a pupil who carried what gave the impression to be a whip and instructed a Black pupil “we used to whip you.”

They also allege unfair punishment: College students are banned from wearing Black Lives Matter shirts, however Confederate flag attire is appropriate underneath the varsity’s costume code, the lawsuit says.

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

Becoming a member of the students as plaintiffs are their mothers, Lekisha Turner and Jessica Murray. Murray claims she was pulled over by a police officer after picking up the suspended children, and detained till school officials offered her with a letter threatening criminal trespassing costs if she was discovered once more on school grounds.

Superintendent Glenn White on Tuesday said the district disputes the allegations but had been advised by legal professionals to not get into specifics at this time. “The Floyd County school system looks ahead to presenting the info on this case in courtroom,” White advised The Associated Press in a phone interview.

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

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

When a group of scholars sought to protest the power of their classmates to put on the Accomplice flag on campus, the principal threatened scholar Deserae Turner that she could possibly be jailed for “instigating a riot,” the lawsuit says. The principal also introduced over the intercom that any scholar protesting and even possessing a flyer saying the protest could be disciplined.

The lawsuit alleges that four Black plaintiffs who organized the protest were suspended for 5 days, while nonblack scholar organizers were not disciplined. Lawyers additionally allege the preemptive shutdown of the protest and demands that college students not put up on social media violated college students’ First Amendment rights. A fifth scholar who was not suspended has additionally sued.

The go well with says gown code rules permitting Accomplice flag apparel however not Black Lives Matter apparel are unlawful viewpoint discrimination by a government agency, which also violates the First Modification. It says the district also has violated the scholars’ and fogeys’ right to equal protection under the 14th Amendment, in addition to the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

Amongst other cures, the plaintiffs demand that the varsity district be blocked from additional punishing the scholars due to their speech, remove prior punishments from college records and pay cash damages.

Among the attorneys bringing the go well with is Shannon Liss-Riordan, a lawyer in search of the Democratic nomination for attorney general in Massachusetts.

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