Oregon mom sues school administrators after truth or dare initiation.
Excerpt from Portland Tribune below
A former Lakeridge High School dancer and her mother told a U.S. District Court jury on Tuesday about a team sleepover that they say devolved from an innocent movie night into a dangerous initiation that involved hazing, bullying and worse.
The Lake Oswego School District and several current or former administrators — Superintendent Heather Beck, Lakeridge High Principal Jennifer Schiele and former Athletic Director Ian Lamont — all face a claim of negligence in the case. So do former dance team coaches Kayla and Ashley Nordlum and former parent volunteer Suzanne Young, who helped with team finances and photos.
In addition, Kayla Nordlum faces claims of false imprisonment, a violation of First Amendment rights and intentional infliction of emotional distress. The plaintiffs are seeking economic and non-economic damages, as well as punitive damages for what court documents call a “malicious, oppressive and/or reckless disregard for plaintiffs’ rights.”
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The former dancer, who is identified in court documents only as “S.A.,” was 14 years old when the alleged incidents took place. Now a high school senior at Lakeridge, she was the first to take the stand Tuesday in what is expected to be a four-day trial.
The girl told jurors that she and other dancers had gathered at a team member’s house for a sleepover and were about to get into their pajamas when plans changed from a movie night to something more.
“All of a sudden, two boys in costumes jumped out,” she said, “and the girls started yelling, ‘Initiation!”
Senior dancers then had the younger girls dress up in costumes and perform a variety of “dares” in downtown Lake Oswego after blindfolding them and making them ride on the floors of the seniors’ cars from location to location, she said.
“They said you have to do it, there was no option. It was just, ‘You’re going to do it,'” the former dancer testified. She said that some of the girls were dared to go into fast food restaurants and shout sexually suggestive things before the entire group was driven to Lakeridge High School.
