Mother sues BOCES for son's bullying

Just weeks after the Nassau County Board of Cooperative Educational Services made headlines for announcing plans to vacate the West Hempstead building where it has operated a middle school for nearly two decades, it has made news again, this time as the co-defendant in a $10.5 million lawsuit.

Woodmere resident Lori Hoffman, an Orthodox Jew, is suing BOCES and the Hewlett-Woodmere Union Free School District for failing to protect her son, Gedaliah, from physical and verbal abuse at the hands of students at the Eagle Avenue Middle School.

According to a criminal complaint filed in federal court on Feb. 24, the bullying began in December 2010, shortly after the public school district placed Gedaliah, who is physically and mentally disabled, in the BOCES special education program. Children allegedly teased and taunted Gedaliah, who wears a yarmulke and other religious articles of clothing. In March 2011, in the presence of BOCES staff members, “other children were permitted to call Gedaliah a ‘f------ Jew’ because he was wearing a yarmulke on his head,” the complaint read.

The suit alleges that staff members who were specifically assigned to protect Gedaliah failed or refused to do so, and that school employees and staffers excused and permitted the abuse and bullying. Furthermore, the suit claims that by punishing Gedaliah for the attacks, the staffers caused the bullying to escalate.

In a previous incident, in January 2011, staff members physically restrained the boy after other students taunted him and insulted his religious beliefs and manner of dress, according to the complaint. Hoffman also claimed that on May 26, 2011, a student removed Gedaliah’s yarmulke and threatened to “knife” him and his family, but staff members blamed her son for the incident. She pulled him out of the school shortly thereafter.

“[Gedaliah] has been caused … great pain and suffering, which continues to date,” the complaint read. “[H]is injuries are permanent in nature; and the plaintiff has been caused to seek medical and mental health treatment.”

Hoffman claims that BOCES and the Hewlett-Woodmere school district violated her son’s federal and state constitutional rights and that they were negligent in hiring, retention and supervision. She is seeking $10 million in damages and $500,000 for the loss of services and the cost of medical treatment she required as a result of the situation.

Hoffman’s attorney, Jay Weinstein, declined to comment on the case, as did spokeswomen for both BOCES and the Hewlett-Woodmere school district.