Cheerleader must compensate school that told her to clap 'rapist'

 

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/am...dependent.co.uk

 

A teenage girl who was dropped from her high school's cheerleading squad after refusing to chant the name of a basketball player who had sexually assaulted her must pay compensation of $45,000 (£27,300) after losing a legal challenge against the decision.

 

The United States Supreme Court on Monday declined to hear a review of the case brought by the woman, who is known only as HS. Lower courts had ruled that she was speaking for the school, rather than for herself, when serving on a cheerleading squad – meaning that she had no right to stay silent when coaches told her to applaud.

 

She was 16 when she said she had been raped at a house party attended by dozens of fellow students from Silsbee High School, in south-east Texas. One of her alleged assailants, a student athlete called Rakheem Bolton, was arrested, with two other young men.

 

In court, Bolton pleaded guilty to the misdemeanour assault of HS. He received two years of probation, community service, a fine and was required to take anger-management classes. The charge of rape was dropped, leaving him free to return to school and take up his place on the basketball team.

 

Four months later, in January 2009, HS travelled to one of Silsbee High School's basketball games in Huntsville. She joined in with the business of leading cheers throughout the match. But when Bolton was about to take a free throw, the girl decided to stand silently with her arms folded.

 

"I didn't want to have to say his name and I didn't want to cheer for him," she later told reporters. "I just didn't want to encourage anything he was doing."

 

Richard Bain, the school superintendent in the sport-obsessed small town, saw things differently. He told HS to leave the gymnasium. Outside, he told her she was required to cheer for Bolton. When the girl said she was unwilling to endorse a man who had sexually assaulted her, she was expelled from the cheerleading squad.

 

The subsequent legal challenge against Mr Bain's decision perhaps highlights the seriousness with which Texans take cheerleading and high school sports, which can attract crowds in the tens of thousands.

 

HS and her parents instructed lawyers to pursue a compensation claim against the principal and the School District in early 2009. Their lawsuit argued that HS's right to exercise free expression had been violated when she was instructed to applaud her attacker. But two separate courts ruled against her, deciding that a cheerleader freely agrees to act as a "mouthpiece" for a institution and therefore surrenders her constitutional right to free speech. In September last year, a federal appeals court upheld those decisions and announced that HS must also reimburse the school sistrict $45,000, for filing a "frivolous" lawsuit against it.

 

"As a cheerleader, HS served as a mouthpiece through which [the school district] could disseminate speech – namely, support for its athletic teams," the appeals court decision says. "This act constituted substantial interference with the work of the school because, as a cheerleader, HS was at the basketball game for the purpose of cheering, a position she undertook voluntarily."

 

The family's lawyer said the ruling meanst that students exercising their right of free speech can end up punished for refusing to follow "insensitive and unreasonable directions".

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Question - just why is this rapist bast*rd even still in the school after doing what he did? That's first off.. Second off, just what kind of perverse "law" is it that rules in this manner against the victim of a crime...? And there certainly does seem to be a very curious interpretation here of "free speech"..

 

Of course, we can kind of answer the first question. He's still in the school because he can throw a ball around, and, as we know, the "jocks" rule all in US schools, have their every whim indulged, are treated like some kind of royalty, just because they can throw a ball around... Pathetic... Oh, and of course it brings money into the school... Which is basically what this boils down to. The school doesn't want to chuck this rapist bast*rd out because money talks, so he gets to stay in school...

I have to hand it to the world.

 

Just when you think it couldn't possibly get any more idiotic and inane, it manages to do so.

 

It's insanity to think you would have to pay such a massive fine just for refusing to cheer for someone. It was hardly a "frivolous" claim they made against the school. I could maybe just about understand her being kicked off the cheerleading squad (although it still wouldn't be fair on her) but to actually have the gall to make the young girl (her family) compensate the school is an outrage.

 

 

I have to hand it to the world.

 

Just when you think it couldn't possibly get any more idiotic and inane, it manages to do so.

 

It's insanity to think you would have to pay such a massive fine just for refusing to cheer for someone. It was hardly a "frivolous" claim they made against the school. I could maybe just about understand her being kicked off the cheerleading squad (although it still wouldn't be fair on her) but to actually have the gall to make the young girl (her family) compensate the school is an outrage.

 

The real outrage is letting a rapist back onto school property or the team so he can have the opportunity to do it again to another cheerleader.. This simply wouldn't be allowed to happen in UK schools..

The real outrage is letting a rapist back onto school property or the team so he can have the opportunity to do it again to another cheerleader.. This simply wouldn't be allowed to happen in UK schools..

Alleged rapist. The rape charge was dropped.

Woah :mellow:

 

I have never understood half the things that occur in the US, it's all so different to over here... But this... I have no words.

 

I mean what a crap system, she has to PAY them for being raped, basically. I mean not clapping someone at a basketball game is really nothing bad at all. I did the same not long ago at my school assembly, this girl I didn't like sang badly, so I didn't clap. Obviously, that's not as serious because me and her didn't have quite as much bad blood as this pair does, but it's the same principle. It just goes to show how seriously they take the 'jock' culture, he's still the hero even when he's raped a girl just because he can shoot some hoops, all the stereotypes shown in shows like Glee are just spot on, I always thought they were drawn out and OTT!

Alleged rapist. The rape charge was dropped.

 

He copped a plea, you know as well as I do that rape is notoriously difficult to prove (I believe one in twenty cases actually results in a conviction...). He certainly did something to the girl, he admitted a lesser charge of assault.. Doesn't alter the fact that he shouldn't have been allowed back into the shool or to the team...

The United States School system revolves around sports, it's completely ridiculous how much they care about sports and how little they care about anything and everyone else.

The United States School system revolves around sports, it's completely ridiculous how much they care about sports and how little they care about anything and everyone else.

 

Yup, that's pretty much it in a nut-shell, if one of the Science Nerds had done this, I have no doubt at all they'd've been thrown out of school and sent down to Juvie Hall.... -_-