Thread: Students file claims against school preventing them from pro

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Students file claims

By Neil Nisperos/Staff Writer
Sixteen Lompoc students, detained and cited in March by police who prevented their daytime immigration policy protest, have filed claims against the school district.

Filed last week, the claims could cost the district about $10,000 for each student, according to an attorney who represents the students.

The students are part of a group of 30 whose offer to settle with the school district was rejected last month. The city and the police department have tentatively accepted the same settlement offer, which granted no monetary compensation for students.

Jeannie Barrett, an attorney with the California Rural Legal Assistance and representative, said she advised the students that $10,000 would be a fair amount, but they could ask for more or less. She said she did not know how much each student claimed.

The school district can reject or accept the claims. If they reject the claims, the students could file a class-action lawsuit, Barrett said.

Police and city officials are expected to complete the terms of the settlement in a public meeting Tuesday in which they will formally apologize to students. The settlement also calls for the citations to be expunged from the students' records and for police to undergo training in the meaning of the First Amendment.

Barrett said she and the parents of the students are annoyed by the school district's refusal to agree to the settlement.

“The police has agreed to do this and we're asking less of the district in the sense that the city has to expunge the records of the students,” Barrett said. “The district didn't have to do any of that - just (First Amendment) staff training and a discussion with students of what they have a right to do and what they don't have a right to do. I have no idea why they thought that was so onerous.”

Frank Lynch, Lompoc schools superintendent, declined to comment on the situation. Wednesday, Dino Velez, the attorney representing the school district, asked for questions to be submitted in writing and said he would respond as soon as possible.

Thirty students, represented by California Rural Legal Assistance, said their constitutional right to free speech was violated when police halted a protest of proposed immigration legislation March 31 at Lompoc High School.

Police, working in conjunction with the Lompoc Unified School District, cited 61 students for violating the city's daylight loitering ordinance. Police and school officials said the students were violating the law by skipping school.

Some students were handcuffed at the school. Students were detained in a school bus or patrol cars and released to their parents at the police department. None were allowed to return to class that day.

Barrett said police ignored a clause in the city's ordinance, Section 2103, which pertains to daylight loitering by minors. An exemption in that law allows students to exercise their First Amendment rights of freedom of speech and assembly.

On the day of the protest, Lynch explained the reason for the police and district response.

“Our concern is the kids need to be in school,” he said. “They have a right to protest, but just not during school hours.”

Steve Pent, a parent of one of the cited students, disagreed.

“It's kind of contradictory,” he said. “If the school district wanted to prevent kids from missing school, why didn't they allow the kids to go back to school. In other words, when the kids were picked up, why didn't they get bused back to the school (after being cited).”

Neil Nisperos can be reached at 737-1059 or nnisperos@lompocrecord.com.

Aug. 3, 2006

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CRLA emerges in protest flap

By Mark Abramson/Staff Writer
A no-cost legal service that until recently has done little business in Lompoc is helping about half of the 61 students cited for their March 31 protest of proposed immigration laws in their litigation against the city, police department and Lompoc Unified School District.

California Rural Legal Assistance Inc. has been around since 1965 and has had an office in Santa Maria since 1966. The CRLA has 21 offices around the state. It provides free legal services to people who otherwise may not be able to afford an attorney. The bulk of its funding - 60 percent - comes from the federal government. Private grant money and state funds pays the remainder of its operations cost.

“Our eligibility levels are pretty darn low - it's 125 percent of the poverty level (and below),” said Jeannie Barrett, a CRLA attorney and the director of its Santa Maria office. “Usually it's low-wage workers who come to us.”

“Poor people have more legal issues. More bad things happen to them.”

According to a January 2005 article in the Fresno Bee, the CRLA helped dairy workers there get $360,000 for not being paid overtime, not getting meal breaks and for not being reimbursed for equipment they bought to use on their jobs.

The CRLA helped families of many of the students cited by police in the March 31 incident reach a settlement with the city and police department that includes the students' citations being tossed out and erased from their record.

It also has helped those families file claims against the school district when the district rejected a proposed settlement. If the district denies the claims, students and their families could sue the district for monetary damages. The CRLA, however, is prohibited by the federal government in representing the families if the case became a class-action lawsuit.

Barrett said she has seen calls about the CRLA from Lompoc increase in the past six months and they have been handling employment-law cases in the area. One case involved CRLA clients who worked for a landscaper on base who wanted to know how they could get unemployment when their boss became difficult to work for and they quit.

A lot of CRLA's business comes from referrals, word of mouth from farmworkers that the CRLA typically represents and from outreach programs, such as the community education forums the organization conducts.

Barrett estimated that there is probably 40,000 eligible people in the area who qualify for CRLA services, which means some clients have to be turned away.

Barrett said she does not know how a parent of one of students who was cited and detained by police for the protest found the CRLA, but that parent spread the word and got other parents to hire the CRLA.

Civil rights cases, like the students' case, is one of the CRLA's specialties, Barrett said. Its other priorities are cases that involve employment law, education, housing, domestic violence and benefits programs, such as welfare. It shies away from family law, personal injury and bankruptcy cases.

“The Lompoc case comes out well in that balancing act because it was a clear-cut violation and it was a large group of people, and I didn't see it as something that was going to take a large amount of time,” Barrett said.

Mark Abramson can be reached at 737-1057 or mabramson@

lompocrecord.com.

Aug. 3, 2006

Police, working in conjunction with the Lompoc Unified School District, cited 61 students for violating the city's daylight loitering ordinance. Police and school officials said the students were violating the law by skipping school.

So I wonder how many students got cited by the police on the May 1st protests? NONE!

Money grubbing.

Exactly, Sippy!

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District rejects student claims
By Neil Nisperos/Staff Writer


The Lompoc school board, on the recommendation of Superintendent Frank Lynch, voted Tuesday to deny the claims filed by 16 students after an aborted immigration protest in March.

Neither Lynch nor board members commented on the issue before the board voted unanimously to deny the claims, which include monetary compensation of an estimated $10,000 each. The board had met in private Thursday to discuss their response to the claims.

“It is our recommendation that we deny the claims at this particular time,” Lynch told the board before they voted.

A group of 63 student activists were detained and cited on March 31 by police, who had met earlier with school district officials. The claims against the school district were filed after district officials declined offers of a settlement.

Because of the denial of the claims, parents intend to file a class-action lawsuit against the school district, according to Elizabeth Reyes-Velasquez, an aunt of one of the students involved in the protest and a Hispanic community activist.

“All that was asked of the board was a public apology and to clear their school records of this, but the district refused to do a public apology, so now it's turned into a litigation issue,” she said. “To us it's not about the money, it's about right and wrong. The district made a mistake. They need to rectify that and we're just concerned the students will be labeled as trouble-makers and be targeted for that.”

Reyes-Velasquez said lawyers have been contacted to pursue a class-action lawsuit against the school district. Earlier, she had the chance to address the board on the issue.

“The students, the parents and the Hispanic community feel that the Lompoc Unified School District Board members, administrators, teachers and employees owe the students an apology for the events of the March 31 protest in which students were arrested and detained,” she said, standing before the board.

Not getting the requested apology, Reyes-Velasquez told the board after the vote, “We'll see you in court.”

Jeannie Barrett, an attorney representing the students, said she was surprised by the silence on the issue from the district and also how quickly the Board reacted to the claims.

“They had six months in which to act on the claims and I thought they might drag it out, but they acted quick,” she said.

Police, working in conjunction with the Lompoc Unified School District, cited 63 students for what police said at the time was a violation of a city daylight loitering ordinance. Police and school officials said the students were violating the daytime curfew truancy law by skipping school.

Barrett said police ignored a clause in the city's ordinance, Section 2103, which prohibits daylight loitering by minors except when students are exercising their First Amendment rights of freedom of speech and assembly.

“Why is it that we want to give the impression that they're not allowed to break a law but everyone else can?” Barrett said. “The real point is that when the police and the school board break a law, they're not supposed to be punished. What lesson is that supposed to give the children?”

On March 31, Lynch cited the need for students to be at school during school hours as the reason for the district and police response to the protest.

The city and police department have since made an apology to the protesters and their families. Terms also included a clearing of the citations from the students' records. Lompoc Police Chief Bill Brown said he regretted the students having been cited.

Neil Nisperos can be reached at 737-1059 or nnisperos@lompoc record.com.

August 23, 2006

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Student protesters may sue district
By Neil Nisperos/Staff Writer


Parents of the Lompoc student protesters who filed claims against the school district after an immigration protest was quashed in March will meet this week to consider filing a class-action lawsuit against the district.

An additional student has filed a claim against the district, bringing the number of claims to 17, according to district officials. Each of the 17 is seeking a settlement of $10,000, according to Dino Velez, an attorney for the school district, and School Superintendent Frank Lynch.

The students and their parents are considering a lawsuit because the district last month rejected the claims. They will meet this week to discuss their options, said community activist Elizabeth Reyes-Velasquez.

Sixty-three students were detained and cited by police March 31 when they walked out of several Lompoc school and met at Lompoc High to protest national immigration issues.

Police and city officials, as part of a settlement with students, subsequently apologized for their actions because a city ordinance allows students to be out of school if they are exercising their First Amendment right to free speech.

The settlement also guaranteed that the citations would be expunged from the students' records.

The settlement involved no compensation.

School officials, on Lynch's recommendation, last month declined to settle.

In a written response to questions by the Lompoc Record, Velez said the district denied the claims because they “lack merit.”

Velez said the district supported a lunchtime protest on the same day that students were cited by police.

“On March 31, 2006, during the lunch recess, Lompoc High School and the Lompoc Unified School District supported a march of over 50 students, as well as numerous adults, who were protesting U.S. immigration laws,” Velez wrote in an e-mail to the Record.

“Those students worked with the school administrators who encouraged the students to protest during recess, and those students did not miss class.”

Lynch expressed the same sentiment when interviewed the day of the protest - that students needed to be in class during school hours.

Reyes-Velasquez said the students had a right to protest “whenever they felt like it.” She cited the “free-speech exception” in the city's ordinance, Section 2103, that police used to cite students.

“You have a right to protest whenever you feel like it and you don't need anybody's permission to protest,” she said. “They don't need to give you verbal or written approval or tell you when it's convenient for them for you to protest. It's your right to exercise at any time.”

Neil Nisperos can be reached at 737-1059 or nnisperos@lompocrecord.com.

Sept. 4, 2006