Sexually harassing teen girls made easier with lawsuits, loopholes and badges
Girls Don’t Matter Part 4: Nobody talk
HURON — In this town, the truth doesn’t just get buried; it gets litigated into silence.
While the Venice Solutions report claims a “lack of witness cooperation” as the reason for clearing school staff of any wrongdoing, it ignores a reality that has defined this district for years: anyone who speaks up against the “Home Team” is likely to be met with a lawsuit.
This I know, firsthand.
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Author’s Note: Cost of a Story
By Matt Westerhold
Reporting on Huron is not just a job; for me, it was a legal battlefield. For several years after two Title IX lawsuits were filed against the school district in 2019, I lived the reality this series describes. In my role as executive editor for Ogden Newspapers Ohio and the Sandusky Register, I was sued by a former School Resource Officer (SRO) who claimed my reporting was defamatory. That suit was dismissed. There was a second lawsuit, too, by the family of a student—an action the newspaper eventually settled to avoid exorbitant legal fees associated with a trial.
So, in addition to the three federal Title IX lawsuits against the district, there’s the two in which my newspaper was sued along with about a dozen local people, including district family members who spoke up. That one was filed in 2021, and a trial date earlier this year was postponed until some time next year.
