A Queens boy survived mind most cancers and a number of foster houses solely to enter a “residing nightmare” when classmates tormented him for being homosexual — and faculty directors blamed him for the bullying, a brand new lawsuit expenses.
Youngsters at IS 126Q in Lengthy Island Metropolis spent two years relentlessly taunting the sufferer as a “fa—t ass,” and “bitch,” slammed him for “performing like a lady” and “advised him that he can be damned to hell by God due to his ‘way of life,’ ” in keeping with a Manhattan Federal Court docket lawsuit filed by the boy’s dad.
Faculty directors accused the boy of both fabricating the harassment or bringing it on himself by being too “open” about his sexuality, even telling the kid he “ought to be taught to respect” a number of the horrific feedback slung at him by different youngsters as a “distinction of opinion,” together with pronouncements that LGBTQ individuals ought to “burn in hell,” the household claims.
“It was devastating to listen to my little one say that they needed to kill themselves as a result of the bullying wouldn’t cease. It’s a horrific state of affairs to be positioned in,” dad Jason Cianciotto advised The Submit.
Cianciotto and his husband adopted the boy in 2018, in what ought to have been a miracle completely happy ending for a kid who’d already endured hell.
The boy, recognized in courtroom papers as “D.S.”, was faraway from his drug addict dad and mom and positioned in foster care when he was simply 7-years-old, bouncing amongst seven foster houses till he was 10.
That’s when D.S. was recognized with a malignant mind tumor, and heartlessly deserted by his then foster mother or father at a hospital, in keeping with the lawsuit.
He had surgical procedure to take away the tumor and his newest exams confirmed no indicators of most cancers, Cianciotto mentioned.
Cianciotto, who lives in Astoria, mentioned he and his husband have been seeking to begin a household and undertake a toddler when he noticed a profile of the boy on a foster care web site.
“I instantly texted it to my husband and mentioned ‘I believe we discovered our son,’ ” he mentioned.
By then, D.S. was 11-years-old, and got here out as homosexual shortly after Cianciotto and his husband introduced the boy residence in 2017. They adopted him the subsequent 12 months.
He began sixth grade at IS 126Q, the Albert Shanker Faculty for Visible and Performing Arts, in 2017, rapidly sharing his sexual orientation with classmates who then relentlessly taunted him for 2 years, in keeping with the go well with filed Monday in opposition to town Division of Training, the college principal and different staffers.
IS 126Q performed solely “half-hearted investigations,” discovering lots of the complaints “unfounded,” Cianciotto charged within the litigation.
The household pulled the boy out of IS 126Q close to the top of seventh grade in 2019. As a result of he had studying disabilities, additionally they requested for a listening to below the People with Disabilities Training Act.
A listening to officer decided in 2020 that “not solely did the college fail to handle the bullying” however a dean “went as far as responsible the scholar for making himself a goal of the bullying,” authorized papers mentioned.
The officer wrote she was “at a loss to grasp how an academic skilled might presumably blame a toddler for being the sufferer of a chronic and extreme
sample of emotional and bodily bullying,” in keeping with courtroom papers.
Her determination directed the DOE to offer the boy with companies, together with tutoring and remedy.
The boy is now doing nicely at one other close by college that was like “evening and day in comparison with IS 126,” Cianciotto mentioned.
Discrimination shouldn’t be tolerated on the idea of race or faith, and shouldn’t have been on this case, mentioned Cianciotto’s lawyer, David Lebowitz.
“The very fact is that LGBT youngsters are not any much less deserving of safety. The varsity and DOE simply fell down on the job right here,” he mentioned.
The go well with seeks unspecified damages, and comes after the DOE reached a 2018 settlement settlement with dad and mom who alleged colleges dropped the ball in defending bullied youngsters. The settlement mandated the DOE comply with protocols to deal with bullying complaints.
A DOE spokeswoman mentioned the company “will overview the grievance and instantly examine the claims.”
“These allegations are deeply troubling and there may be completely zero tolerance for bullying or harassment of any type in our colleges,” she mentioned.
