CHARLESTON – A mother has sued the Kanawha County Board of Education alleging it is responsible for her disabled teen daughter’s suicide.
Myranda Diaz filed the complaint September 12 in Kanawha Circuit Court. The board is the only defendant named in the lawsuit.
According to the complaint, Diaz’ daughter Destiny Ariel Diaz, was a 13-year-old disabled special education student at John Adams Middle School. The complaint says Destiny had multiple disabilities, but it does not include further details.
“Destiny was repeatedly made fun of, beaten, assaulted and bullied at JAMS,” the complaint states. “Destiny, her mother and grandmother complained on multiple occasions and repeatedly reached out for help at the school to stop the harassment, beatings and bullying and relied on the employees, administrators, teachers and counselors to take reasonable and prompt action.”
Still, she says the issues continued until Destiny began exhibiting multiple early suicide warning signs at school such as self-harm and discussing her death with school employees. She says JAMS administrators, teachers and counselors knew of the signs but failed to take reasonable and prompt action before Destiny committed suicide on October 29, 2022. She was 13.
“Instead of promptly performing a required suicide assessment, prevention and intervention as required by law and school policy, her known suicide warning signs were not reasonably or promptly addressed by her teacher, counselor or school administrators which proximately caused her death by suicide,” the complaint states. “In essence, her teachers, counselors and administrators turned a blind eye to her harassment, beatings, bullying and obvious suicide warning signs.”
It alleges school staff not only failed to address the warning signs but also “negligently began victim shaming Destiny and accusing her of wrongdoing and blaming her for the bullying, beatings and harassment and other wrongdoing.”
Diaz says Destiny told her teacher “she was not afraid to die,” and that the teacher told other school staff and administrators of that comment.
Diaz accuses school staff of negligence and violating their duty of taking care under the circumstances. She says she had numerous meetings and communications with school staff about Destiny and issues of an unsafe school environment, bullying, the self-harm and mental health issues. She says the staff agreed to take care of the issues.
Other allegations in the 27-page complaint include claims that JAMS administrators accused Destiny of being racist and failed to report her circumstances to the Department of Health and Human Resources. It also says Destiny was subjected to higher scrutiny regarding school policy enforcement and, as a result, was suspended for 10 days. That suspension, Diaz claims, substantially contributed to Destiny’s death.
It says one school administrator began crying during a meeting with Diaz because “she knew Destiny Diaz was suffering and was likely to inflict self-harm.”
The defendants are accused of negligence, negligent training and disability discrimination in violation of the West Virginia Human Rights Act, negligent supervision and negligent infliction of emotional distress.
Diaz seeks compensatory damages, special damages and general damages, including damages for pain and suffering and Destiny’s personal injuries and wrongful death. She also seeks pre- and post-judgment interests, burial expenses, loss of income, attorney fees, court costs and other relief.
A spokeswoman for the board said its general counsel has not yet been served a copy of the complaint and did not comment further.
She is being represented by attorney John W. Alderman III of Charleston and by David R. Barney Jr. of Thompson Barney in Charleston. The case has been assigned to Circuit Judge Kenneth Ballard.
Kanawha Circuit Court case number 23-C-806