Coach wanted to rid campus of drugs. But plan costs district $300K to settle lawsuit

Two former Clovis North High School students, who say a school employee asked them to participate in a drug sting on campus without their parents’ consent, have settled their civil lawsuit with the Clovis Unified School District.

The school district paid the two students $300,000, Clovis Unified spokeswoman Kelly Avants said Wednesday.

The names of the two students, who were freshmen at the time of the incident, were not made public because they’re minors. They were identified in Fresno County Superior Court documents as John Doe and Mary Roe.

Fresno attorney Stephen Cornwell, who represented the two students, said his clients received equal shares of the settlement this month.

The two students sought damages from the district on a number of legal grounds, including negligent supervision, false arrest, humiliation and intentional infliction of emotional distress.

Avants said Wednesday the school district doesn’t talk about litigation, but felt the settlement was reasonable. Cornwell also said the settlement was fair, but said his clients had to endure some mental anguish.

For example, Cornwell said he wanted to keep the students’ identities confidential, but once they sued the district, Clovis Unified trustees identified them on one of their agendas under potential litigation. “I’m not sure if it was inadvertent or on purpose,” Cornwell said.

John Doe remained at Clovis North and graduated last year, but once word got out that he was involved in a drug sting, some people ostracized him, Cornwell said. The incident forced Mary Roe to leave Clovis North and her friends to be home-schooled, the lawyer said. She also attended a charter school before returning to Clovis North in her senior year to graduate last year.

The settlement could have been done sooner, but Cornwell said Clovis Unified wanted him and the students to sign a non-disparagement clause in the settlement papers that would prevent them from saying any negative things about the school district. Cornwell said he and his clients declined to sign the settlement papers if the clause remained. “The truth is the truth,” Cornwell said.

Cornwell declined to name the school employee who got his clients in trouble, saying the employee had the right intentions of wanting to rid the Clovis North campus of drugs. “She went about it the wrong way,” he said.

Court papers identify the employee as Kelly Racca, who was listed in the lawsuit as a Clovis North counselor. She was a campus safety monitor at the time of the incident and also had served as a volleyball coach at Clovis North. An online biography stated she has a master’s degree in counseling from California State University, Fresno.

Avants said Racca resigned after the incident. Racca could not be reached for comment.

The lawsuit, filed March 11, 2014, spells out the allegations:

Racca decided to develop a plan to stop the illegal sales of marijuana on campus. She befriended Mary and asked her to assist in her drug sting. Racca then gave Mary money to buy the marijuana and Racca recorded the serial numbers of the bills in order to link them to the drug seller.

“Specifically, she asked Mary to find out the identity of a student who was reported to be illegally selling marijuana on campus,” the lawsuit states.

Mary, however, was hesitant to get involved in the drug sting, so she told her friend, John, who agreed to help if Racca would assist them in getting an expelled student reinstated into school. “Racca agreed to do so, “ the lawsuit says.

Following Racca’s instruction, John bought marijuana from a student on campus using Racca’s money. Mary took a photograph of the transaction to implicate the student. John and Mary later turned over the marijuana and photograph to Racca.

The next day, however, school administrators called Mary out of her class for a meeting with two Clovis police officers. Without notifying her parents, police interrogated Mary and she was told to write her account of the drug buy, the lawsuit says. After police threatened to arrest her, Mary waited in the Student Services office for many hours without any explanation of what would happen to her and without her parents being contacted. She finally was allowed to leave without being arrested.

School officials and police officers also called John into a conference room but did not advise him of his Miranda rights. John asked to call his father, but his request was denied, the lawsuit says. School officials and police then questioned him at length, ignoring his pleas to contact his father, the lawsuit says. John was not arrested, but some days later school officials called Mary out of class again and ordered her to write an incident report about the drug purchase.

In reaching the settlement, Cornwell said neither Mary nor John were advised that the school employee’s plan was illegal and a violation of the district’s zero-tolerance drug policy. The two students assumed the employee who concocted the drug sting was authorized to conduct her plan, he said, noting that the employee never notified police of her plan, nor did she have law enforcement background to conduct a drug investigation,

In addition, neither school officials nor police advised Mary or John of their right to a lawyer and their right to refuse to answer questions that could incriminate them, Cornwell said.

The Clovis North students’ lawsuit mirrors one filed in a Los Angeles case.

In December, the state’s 2nd District Court of Appeals upheld a jury’s verdict that ordered the Los Angeles Unified School District to pay a student $1 million in damages for emotional distress, as well as $15,250 in economic damages.

A civil lawsuit accused school officials of using the 12-year-old as bait in a drug sting at Porter Middle School in February 2009.

The lawsuit states school officials gave the student money to purchase marijuana from the drug dealer and did not notify the student’s parents or law enforcement. As a result, the student suffered bodily harm and emotional distress, and incurred medical expenses, the appellate court said in a split decision.

This story was originally published January 25, 2017 at 2:10 PM with the headline "Coach wanted to rid campus of drugs. But plan costs district $300K to settle lawsuit."