Judge finds in favor of Orono schools over transgender girl's use of bathroom
By Judy Harrison, BDN Staff
Posted Nov. 20, 2012, at 3:28 p.m.
Last modified Nov. 21, 2012, at 2:13 p.m.
http://bangordailynews.com/2012/11/20/news/bangor/judge-finds-in-favor-of-orono-schools-over-transgender-girls-use-of-bathroom/BANGOR, Maine — A Superior Court judge on Tuesday r uled in favor of the Orono schools and against the parents of a transgender child who in 2007 was forced to stop using the girls bathroom and told to use a staff bathroom after the grandfather of a male student complained.
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Justice William Anderson granted summary judgment to Riverside RSU 26, formerly the Orono School District.
"The court is not unsympathetic to [the girl's] plight, or that of her parents," Anderson wrote in his 26-page opinion. "It is no doubt a difficult thing to grow up transgender in today's society. This is a sad truth, which cannot be completely prevented by the law alone. The law casts a broad stroke where one more delicate and refined is needed. Although others mistreated [the girl] because she is transgender, our Maine Human Rights Act only holds a school accountable for deliberate indifference to known, severe and pervasive student-on-student harassment. It does no more.
"In this case, the school acted within the bounds of its authority in prohibiting [the girl] from using the girls' restroom; it did not itself harass [the girl] by its actions, and it was not deliberately indifferent to the harassment that [she] experienced from others," the judge concluded.
"The court finds that there is no evidence of deliberate indifference with respect to plaintiff's claims of education discrimination, and it finds that defendants acted within the law under the public accommodation discrimination claim. Therefore, the court grants summary judgment to [the school district]."
