Parents sue Florida school district over bullied son's suicide
A lawsuit filed Monday against the a Florida school district alleges that teachers and administrators didn't do enough to prevent bullying that led to a 14-year-old boy's suicide last year.
Lamar Hawkins III, of Sanford, killed himself Sept. 10, 2014 with his father's gun in a bathroom stall at Greenwood Lakes Middle School in Lake Mary.
Attorney Matt Morgan said Lamar went missing for hours and school officials didn't look for him— even after another student found a spent gun shell casing in the school's bathroom and reported it to a teacher.
Lamar's family reported him missing after his mother went to the school to pick him up about 5 p.m. and he was nowhere to be found. Deputies found Lamar in the bathroom with a gunshot wound to his head about 11 p.m.
Lamar's family is suing the Seminole County School Board, alleging negligent supervision, negligent failure to adequately discipline bullies and negligent failure to supervise and account for Lamar's absence before his death.
"We know that just days before he took his life at school that he was literally slapped out of his chair during an altercation," Morgan said at a news conference Monday.
"He took his life at school to send a message, and the message was clear," Morgan continued: "'These bullies drove me to this point so I will commit this act on school grounds so that they know they did this to me.'"
Walt Griffin, the superintendent of Seminole County Public Schools, would not comment on the lawsuit.
After Lamar's death, investigators said the gun the eighth grader used to shoot himself belonged to his father, Lamar Hawkins Sr.
A report released by the Seminole County Sheriff's Office in February said the boy's father, Lamar Hawkins Sr., kept the 40-caliber pistol locked in a gun box in his bedroom closet.
The day Lamar shot himself, his father mistakenly grabbed his wife's keys when he left the house — leaving the key to the gun box at home.
Lamar didn't leave behind a suicide note.
According to the Sanford family, years of bullying led to Lamar's suicide. Because health complications stunted his growth — he was about 4 feet, 5 inches — Lamar was an easy target for bullies.
At the time, Seminole County Public School officials referenced the School Board's comprehensive bullying policy which, they said, is fully enforced in all of their schools.
The School Board's policy manual defines bullying and cyberbullying as unwanted and repeated written, verbal or physical behavior that is systematically used to inflict physical hurt or distress on another student.
After dozens of interviews, Sheriff's Office investigators found that Lamar and his twin sister were picked on and called names but that they were not physically harmed except for a lunchroom fight two days before Lamar's suicide involving Lamar and another student.
Morgan said he received hundreds of phone calls from parents in the area and nationally, complaining that their children have also been bullied at school.
He said a few parents of students at Greenwood Lakes Middle School also called about bullying.
"It appeared to me that there is a big problem at that school," Morgan said about Greenwood Lakes Middle School. That was my opinion as a result of the conversations I had with these parents."
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