NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles!
The legal team representing two boys suspended for questioning a transgender classmate’s access to the boys’ locker room have now filed an amended federal complaint alleging fresh factual claims and a new conspiracy charge, as they escalate their federal case against the Loudoun County Public Schools (LCPS) in Virginia.
America First Legal and the Founding Freedoms Law Center, who are representing the boys and their families, added new factual allegations to their previously submitted federal complaint on Wednesday, alleging LCPS engaged in a conspiracy to retaliate against the boys. It also claimed there were alleged inconsistencies in the district’s handling of its Title IX investigation that found the boys guilty of sexual harassment and suspended them for 10 days.
“Loudoun County Public Schools’ Title IX investigation into our clients inexplicably relied on non-credible evidence, ignored credible witness testimony, failed to interview key
witnesses, deleted potentially exonerating video evidence, and failed to disclose LCPS’s own admission that the allegations against our clients did not constitute sexual harassment,” said Ian Prior, Senior Counsel at America First Legal.
VIRGINIA PARENTS CRUSH FUNDRAISING GOAL FOR TRANS LOCKER ROOM FIGHT AFTER JUDGE ORDERED MASSIVE BOND
Video from a locker room in Stone Bridge High School where a trans male was in a male bathroom. (Loudoun County Sheriff’s Office)
“Making matters worse, and as we set forth in the amended complaint, it appears that the school board was passing along confidential information to a political action committee for the purpose of further retaliating against our clients and their families. If proven true at trial, and we intend to do exactly that, this entire affair is a travesty of justice, a waste of taxpayer money to defend, and everything that is wrong with the Loudoun County School Board and its misplaced priorities.”
Earlier this year, LCPS, located in Northern Virginia, launched a Title IX sexual harassment investigation into two high-school-aged boys after they were videotaped by a biological female who identified as transgender inside the boys’ locker room. The video caught them outwardly complaining to each other about the fact that there was a biological girl who identified as a boy using their facilities.
Before taking the case to federal court, the boys and their parents sought to appeal LCPS’s Title IX sexual harassment finding to keep the boys from being suspended or marked as sexual harassers on their permanent record. However, their appeal was ultimately denied by the district, leading the families to pursue action in federal court.
On Wednesday, the families turned up the heat with fresh allegations not laid out in their original complaint, including that the district conspired with a local political action committee, Loudoun for All, for the purpose of retaliating against the boys and their families.
The amended complaint also points to inconsistencies in the district’s Title IX investigation, such as relying on non-credible evidence, ignoring credible evidence and witness testimony, misrepresenting evidence, failing to interview key witnesses, and failing to disclose potentially exonerating evidence.
PRESSURE MOUNTS ON VIRGINIA DEMS TO CLEARLY STATE VIEW ON TRANS BATHROOMS AFTER BOMBSHELL EMAILS
Fox News Digital interviewed two Virginia parents whose kids have been accused of sexual harassment for complaining about a biological girl who identifies as a boy using their locker room. (Fox News/istock)
The fresh complaint claims that days after the federal court issued a preliminary injunction halting LCPS from suspending the boys or making Title IX findings part of their student record, the district reached out to Loudoun For All and corroborated with them on a press release and other messaging materials that included “a number of false and defamatory allegations” used to generate a public narrative against the boys and their families. The press releases and other materials, such as a timeline of the case’s events, were listed on the political action committee’s website, Facebook page, Reddit account and Bluesky account, and allegedly also contained privileged, confidential information pertaining to the case cited in a subsequent local media report titled, “Locker Room Lawsuit Against LCPS Involves Misinformation, Loudoun4All Says.”
The press release Loudoun For All put out accused the boys’ parents of “orchestrat[ing] a coordinated campaign of disinformation, knowingly misrepresenting facts to fuel political outrage,” and argued that they were trying to “inflame voters ahead of an election.”
It also claimed that 24 witnesses corroborated that the boys’ called the female student, who identifies as transgender, a “girl,” “it,” “girl-boy,” and told them “get out” while inside the boy’s locker room. But, according to the boys’ legal counsel, witnesses never corroborated these claims and the female student’s accusations of when the harassment took place appeared to be inconsistent.
Loudoun For All did not respond to Fox News Digital’s request for comment.
WOMAN DISROBES AT CALIFORNIA SCHOOL BOARD MEETING IN PROTEST OF LOCKER ROOM POLICIES
Meanwhile, the complaint also alleges that LCPS failed to disclose that a video cited as evidence in the district’s Title IX finding against the boys included the female student saying “I got it” while laughing. It adds that the district allegedly deleted other video the female student took of boys using or coming out of the bathroom.
The amended complaint notes that despite inconsistencies in the female student’s story at times, they were credited with “superior credibility” by Title IX investigators in the district. Furthermore, it claims that a threat assessment of the male students found no threat and the district had previously concluded that a situation similar to the one at hand resulted in the district finding no cause for a sexual harassment under federal law.
LCPS declined to comment on the amended complaint, telling Fox News Digital that it is the district’s practice not to comment on pending legal matters.
A transgender flag waves at an undisclosed location on an undisclosed date (left). A judge uses his gavel (right). (Getty Images/iStock)
Shortly after LCPS denied the boys’ Title IX appeal, the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights found LCPS violated Title IX by discriminating against the boys on the basis of sex. Specifically, the Education Department’s Office of Civil Rights determined LCPS “failed to meaningfully investigate complaints of sexual harassment by two male students concerning the presence of a member of the opposite sex in male-only intimate spaces yet thoroughly investigated the female student’s sexual harassment complaint about the boys.”
Both of the boy’s parents told Fox News Digital in August that their sons attempted to voice discomfort to school officials about the female classmate using their locker room, but that their complaints fell on deaf ears.
ASHBURN, VA – AUGUST 11: Supporters of Policy 8040 celebrate with signs as the transgender protection measures were voted into the school system’s policies during a school board meeting at the Loudoun County Public Schools Administration Building on August 11, 2021 in Ashburn, Va. (Ricky Carioti/The Washington Post via Getty Images)
The Trump administration indicated LCPS would lose federal funding if they did not rescind its suspensions and sexual harassment findings against the two boys, review its initial findings, and investigate the Title IX complaint the boys filed against the female student for videotaping them in the locker room, which the boys’ attorneys say was ignored by the district.
CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP
“The amended complaint we filed today unveils Loudoun County Public Schools’ sham targeting of these boys while it ignored numerous, credible threats to their privacy and safety,” said Victoria Cobb, President of the Founding Freedoms Law Center. “As alleged, a female student repeatedly filmed male students, including while using the bathroom, yet Loudoun did nothing. Instead, Loudoun appears to have conspired with an outside political organization to continue its attacks against these boys and their parents.”
The Trump administration has also included LCPS among a list of five Northern Virginia school districts in violation of Title IX due to their locker room and bathroom policies. As a result of that determination, the districts’ federal funding will now be “done by reimbursement only” and the Trump administration commenced proceedings to potentially terminate their funding altogether, the Education Department indicated over the summer.