A former Mount Desert Island high school student has filed a federal lawsuit against the school’s current principal, alleging the administrator failed to intervene during a 2024 assault on school property.
The civil complaint stems from an alleged attack at Mount Desert Island High School on the morning of Oct. 3, 2024, according to the lawsuit filed Tuesday in the U.S. District Court of Maine. The complaint alleges that Principal Matthew Haney watched a student assault a classmate and instructed a bystander to not intervene.
The Bangor Daily News is not identifying either of the former students involved because both were minors at the time of the incident, according to prior media reports, and one is an alleged victim of assault.
The assault allegedly began on a school bus when the student who is accused of the attack — who the lawsuit says was known to struggle with mental health problems — punched two of her peers.
The bus driver phoned Haney to warn him of the attack and request police presence upon their arrival at school, more than 20 minutes later, according to the lawsuit.
But instead, the complaint says, only Haney and a school nurse were present when the bus pulled into MDI high school that morning.
Once off the bus, the student who is accused of the attack allegedly resumed the assault: she repeatedly smashed a steel water bottle over her classmate’s head, forced her to the pavement, bit her face and punched her in the head and eye, the suit says.
A video that captured the incident later circulated online, attracting widespread media attention, some of which was generated because the alleged attacker is transgender.
Throughout the assault, Haney stood by and told the bus driver to “not touch” the student and to “let them fight it out,” according to the complaint.
The victim was left with a concussion, a “human bite to the face” and post-traumatic stress disorder, the lawsuit says.
Haney declined to comment on the matter when reached Wednesday by the Bangor Daily News.
The complaint says Haney had “actual notice” that the “fight was not over” and should have had police present by the time the bus had arrived. Once the students had exited the bus, Haney “failed to do anything aside from watch” the student be “brutally assaulted,” according to the lawsuit.
Michael Zboray, superintendent for the MDI school system, declined to comment on the matter when contacted Wednesday by the Bangor Daily News. Zboray previously said employee contact with students is directed by the state’s Restraint and Seclusion Law, according to online news outlet Bar Harbor Story.
Staff are only allowed to use physical restraint when the “behavior of a student presents an imminent risk of serious physical injury to the student or others, and only after other less intrusive interventions have failed or been deemed inappropriate,” according to the school’s physical restraint procedure.
Before the assault, the complainant alleges she informed Haney that she was being harassed by the student who would later attack her, but the principal had not acted to resolve their dispute, the lawsuit says.
The complainant had reported to school officials before the alleged assault that her classmate was calling her “transphobic” online, according to the lawsuit.
The lawsuit alleges that the student accused of the assault had transferred from Ellsworth High School, where other students had filed harassment complaints against her.
The lawsuit involves a single federal civil rights claim, arguing that Haney not intervening violated the student’s constitutional rights.
The plaintiff is seeking compensatory and punitive damages, as well as attorney’s fees.
Jack Baldacci, the plaintiff’s attorney, said “Principal Haney had clear advance notice of the danger posed by the other student, yet he failed to protect” Baldacci’s client. The student accused of the attack was temporarily suspended after the incident, as was the plaintiff, Baldacci said.
