An Ohio woman is suing her daughter's school district after the mentally impaired child was allegedly sexually assaulted several times by another student at her middle school.
The girl, who is now 15 and suffers from Down syndrome, was an eighth-grade student in the special education program at Discovery Middle School in Canton when the alleged attacks took place.
"Somebody needs to be held accountable for what happened to my daughter," the girl's mother, Angela Maiorana, told Fox affiliate WJBK-TV.
Maiorana said a teacher was alerted to the alleged assaults in March when she caught the suspect in a hallway with her daughter, who was pinned up against a wall. The student later admitted to assaulting the teen on several occasions, according to Maiorana.
The woman said the school then called her to notify her about the alleged attack.
"We questioned her when she came home and asked her about it," Maiorana said of her daughter. "I asked her why she didn't tell me when it happened, and she said she was afraid I wouldn't love her anymore."
According to a lawsuit filed by Maiorana against the Plymouth-Canton School District, the suspect had been transferred from another school for sexually assaulting students there.
He is reportedly facing criminal charges in juvenile court.
In a statement sent to WJBK-TV, Michael Dorfman, an attorney for the school district, said, "What we're hoping to accomplish is that special education students in the Plymouth-Canton School District are treated with respect and not warehoused, and that they are given the appropriate education that they need and the proper monitoring so that they can thrive."
Click to read more on this story from MyFoxDetroit.com
Mom Says Special Needs Daughter Was Sexually Assaulted at School: MyFoxDETROIT.com
The hottest stories ripped from the headlines, from crime to courts, legal and scandal.
