A Jewish student at Desert Shadows Middle School in Scottsdale, Ariz., was subjected to “severe, persistent and pervasive” Jew-hatred on campus between April 20 and May 21, the Anti-Defamation League stated in a complaint filed with the U.S. Department of Education.
The alleged incidents occurred at the public school, which is part of the Paradise Valley Unified School District. The public school district serves about 24,350 students in about 50 schools.
James Pasch, vice president of litigation at the ADL, stated that “the district failed to effectively remedy the ongoing harassment in violation of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act.”
“This harassment then escalated to the point where this student was then physically assaulted,” he stated. “Rather than focus on addressing the incidents in a systemic manner, the district isolated the victim and attempted to make excuses for the antisemitic harassment.”
The complaint, which the ADL and the Reed Smith firm filed on Oct. 16, alleged that the Jewish student’s peers called her a “dirty, filthy Jew” and that she should be sent to a concentration camp and be “gassed.”
She initially reported the behavior to her teacher, who said that it wasn’t his problem, according to the complaint. That response prompted a teacher in a nearby classroom to intervene and take the Jewish student to the principal’s office to file an incident report.
School administrators “did not treat this matter with the seriousness it demanded,” the complaint stated.
One of the perpetrators was suspended for three days, and one of his friends told the Jewish student that she would “regret what she did for snitching” and to “watch out,” the complaint alleges. The Jewish student’s father filed a police report.
Another student allegedly shouted “Jew, Jew, Jew” at the Jewish student in a school hallway and performed a “heil Hitler” salute at her. When she reported that to the school, “administrators responded with visible irritation: sighing, exchanging looks and treating her complaint as an annoyance rather than an escalation of antisemitic abuse,” the complaint alleged.
Another student, who was asked if he liked the Jewish student, said that he would “never like an ugly Jew,” which became widely known on campus, according to the complaint.
The complaint alleged that when the Jewish student reported it to the school, it took about a week—the last day of school—for the school to address it.
‘Inadequate measures’
The principal and assistant principal excused the behavior of the student who said “ugly Jew,” and the principal said that the alleged perpetrator is “very religious” and that the assistant principal couldn’t believe “he would do this, because he’s so religious,” according to the complaint.
The alleged offender was called into the principal’s office during class, and after he came back, the Jewish student accidentally bumped into him during yearbook signings. The former then “turned around, grabbed Student A by her chest and back, and shoved her across a desk into a cabinet,” which caused the Jewish student to suffer visible bruises on her hips, according to the complaint.
The principal later told the Jewish student that there was nothing the school could do about it since it was the last day of school, according to the complaint.
The complaint alleged that the district took “inadequate measures” in response to the conduct and cited delayed response times, attempts to “minimize the harassment” that the Jewish student faced and implementing “inappropriate” protective measures.
The measures included having an adult temporarily escort the Jewish student between classes, and when that ended, the school had her stay in the principal’s office during seventh- and eighth-period classes, according to the complaint.
The complaint also alleged that the school held a single-period class addressing “hate speech,” during which it was unclear if Jew-hatred was addressed, and that the school rejected the Jewish student’s father’s request for a Holocaust survivor to speak on campus.
As a result of the alleged conduct, the Jewish student “spent her final weeks of middle school confined away from her peers, while her harassers continued attending classes without meaningful consequence,” the complaint alleged.
“By the end of the school year, she had accumulated more than 45 missing assignments and her grades dropped significantly,” it said.
She is now in counseling and no longer wears her Magen David, according to the complaint.
The complaint accuses the district of having “permitted a hostile environment to exist” and called on the district to implement a series of corrective measures, including adopting the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s definition of Jew-hatred.
It also said that the public school district should institute mandatory Jew-hatred training for teachers, staff and students and appoint a coordinator to oversee the district’s compliance with Title VI of the 1964 Civil Rights Act.
The district told JNS that it “unequivocally condemns antisemitism and all forms of hate and discrimination.”
“We take these incidents seriously, investigate reports of hateful or discriminatory behavior thoroughly, and take disciplinary action in accordance with the PVSchools family/student handbook,” it said.
“While federal student privacy laws prevent us from sharing specific disciplinary actions, we can assure our community that, as each individual incident was reported last school year, it was immediately investigated and addressed,” the district told JNS.
