Story at a glance
- A Missouri jury this week awarded more than $4 million to a transgender student who was denied access to boys’ restrooms and locker rooms.
- The student had legally changed his name in 2010 and his birth certificate was amended in 2014 to reflect that name, as well as his gender.
- The lawsuit filed by the student’s mother was originally filed in 2015 and dismissed in 2016. The suit was successfully appealed to the Missouri Supreme Court in 2019.
A jury this week said a Kansas City school district must pay a transgender student more than $4 million after he was denied access to the boys’ restrooms and locker rooms at school.
The Blue Springs school district in Missouri discriminated against the student based on his sex, a Jackson County jury decided.
The school district in a statement said it did not agree with the verdict and will be “seeking appropriate relief from the trial court and court of appeals if necessary,” NBC affiliate KSHB-TV reported.
The student, assigned female at birth, legally changed his name in 2010 and, in 2014, successfully petitioned the Jackson County Circuit Court to amend his birth certificate to reflect that name, as well as his gender.
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But the student was still barred from using male facilities at both Delta Woods Middle School and the Blue Springs High School Freshman Center because he allegedly had “female genitalia,” according to KSHB-TV.
“Defendants again denied [the plaintiff] access to the boys’ restrooms and locker rooms even though he is recognized as a boy under the laws of the state of Missouri,” a court document said. “Defendants continue to deny [the plaintiff] access to the boys’ restrooms and locker rooms as of the filing of this Petition.”
The student participated in school sports in middle school, including the eighth grade boys’ football and track teams, but was still made to use a separate single-person bathroom outside the boys’ locker rooms, making him feel singled out and inferior to other boys.
The student’s mother, Rachelle Appleberry, filed a lawsuit in 2015 alleging her son was being discriminated against and receiving unequal treatment at school because of his sex. Her case was thrown out in 2016 when lawyers for the school district argued that gender identity is not a protected status under the Missouri Human Rights Act.
The case was successfully appealed to the Missouri Supreme Court in 2019, but later moved back to the Circuit Court, where a jury trial was held in early December of this year.
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