DETROIT – A 14-year-old student suspended for not having a hair cut returned to his Detroit charter school Thursday.
The Detroit News and the Detroit Free Press report a Wayne County judge has ordered Old Redford Academy to temporarily re-admit Claudius Benson II. His Afro puff hairstyle got him suspended on Sept. 6.
He can keep going as the Michigan ACLU civil rights lawsuit on his behalf moves forward.
Benson has not had a hair cut in more than a decade because his family follows Jewish traditions and Old Testament passages prohibiting it.
School officials claim Benson's long hair violates its strict dress code. They say the policy requires boys wear "close cropped hair," with no braids, twists, or dreadlocks.
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