Parents sue Cobb County School District over mask mandate

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Five parents with students in the Cobb County School District have filed a lawsuit against the district’s face mask mandate.Campbell High School lockdown

The suit, filed April 9 in Cobb Superior Court, claims that the district’s mandate, which was announced before the start of the current school year, “has arbitrarily and capriciously segregated the student population.”

The mandate, which applies to all students, teachers and other staff working on school campuses, has effectively created two “separate, but unequal” learning environments, one in-person, and one virtual, according to the lawsuit.

(You can read it here.)

The suit, which names Superintendent Chris Ragsdale and the seven members of the Cobb County Board of Education as defendants, also alleges that the district’s contact tracing procedures are an invasion of privacy and violate federal health privacy laws.

The plaintiffs—listed as Caryn Sonderman, Matt Gill, Andrei Marcu, Gretchen Brochard and Erin White—are seeking a temporary restraining order against the mandate and a hearing has been scheduled for Tuesday at 11 a.m. before Senior Presiding Judge James Bodiford in Cobb Superior Court.

Ragsdale announced the mask mandate last July, after initially saying masks would be “highly recommended.”

The plaintiffs claim that masks don’t work, saying it’s a “scientifically baseless ‘solution’ that is pure political theater and harms children in its own way.”

Affidavits signed by the plaintiffs claim their children have been adversely affected by having to wear masks when attending classes in-person.

They include a student at Walton High School whom, the lawsuit claims, has been able to attend classes on campus only a couple weeks this school year. The masks constrict the breathing of the student, who has ADHD.

Another student at Wheeler High School has found it “difficult to breathe” wearing a mask throughout the school day and “has developed cynicism at 15 years old” and distrust of adults at the school.

A kindergarten student at Timber Ridge Elementary School also has complained of not being able to breathe, according to a parental affidavit filed with the lawsuit.

The lawsuit is being filed with about a month left in the 2020-21 school year.

The Cobb school year began all-virtual in August due to high COVID-19 case figures, which prompted protests by parents. An incremental classroom return began in October.

The final days of the fall semester also went all-online in November with another case surge, but the spring semester began in hybrid fashion in January.

Some teachers and parents pleaded for an all-virtual return after three Cobb school teachers died in December and January from COVID-19.

More recently, some Cobb parents have been speaking out against the mask mandate, including the mother of four students in East Cobb schools who organized the protest against the all-virtual start to the school year.

Amy Henry told the school board last month that “we’re putting on a show and denying our children in the process” by requiring students who attend classes in person to wear masks at all times.

“They need to have a normal childhood,” she said. “We’re teaching them that they’re dirty. We’re creating a fearful environment that for these kids cannot be normal.”

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38 thoughts on “Parents sue Cobb County School District over mask mandate”

  1. Pingback: Atlanta elections: The rest of the ballot - The Mainline

  2. Why do I have the feeling that the kids of these parents would be the first to mock or bully any kids wearing a mask if it was optional in the school?

  3. From another source about one of the parents in the lawsuit:
    “Father of four, John Hanson, is concerned about his three teens and middle schooler. He said his daughter broke out with a bacterial infection on her face, which he believes came from wearing the mask”.

    Here’s a tip. You do need to wash masks. Maybe someone should call child services because he sends his daughter to school in a dirty mask.

  4. Why did it seem like the writing in this “lawsuit” was done by a high school student. This was hilarious to read. Terrible and laughable.

    • Have you read “Medical Hypotheses”?

      Medical Hypotheses is a not-conventionally-peer reviewed medical journal published by Elsevier. It was originally intended as a forum for unconventional ideas without the traditional filter of scientific peer review, “as long as (the ideas) are coherent and clearly expressed” in order to “foster the diversity and debate upon which the scientific process thrives.” The publication of papers on AIDS denialism led to calls to remove it from PubMed, the United States National Library of Medicine online journal database.

  7. I think all who refuse to wear a mask or people who refuse to get the vaccine. Or the government that says mask are not needed anymore should be held for murder if someone that has been near them get covid 19 and die from it. I have don’t like wearing the damn thing but I do wear one everytime I go out and will continue to do so. Put ur big person panties on and suck it up!! You could save a life

    • Amen. My feelings exactly. They say they want their kids to have a normal childhood. Yet the best way to get back to that is to wear mask and distance so we can beat this thing and get back to the do called normal. It’s better for your darn kids to live through this and live to go through their childhood thsn end up dead and never see a normal ever again. How much people can one kid infect if they bring that illness into the school then others take it home to their family and friends. People like them are why we will be in this thing longer than necessary. There sadly will always be the few selfish, sel indulgent, arrogant few who think only of “me” rather than, “we” in this selfish country.

    • My body my choice right jackass? Read the Constitution you dimwit. There is not any science behind the diapers on your face. Just compliance.

  8. This lawsuit is frivolous and without merit. They do not speak for my child’s interest. This is reckless and irresponsible. I will be attending the hearing tomorrow. By the way, this is the Plaintiffs’ attorney smh:

    Mitch Skandalakis
    From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

    Demetrios John “Mitch” Skandalakis is an American lawyer and former Republican Party politician from Georgia who rose quickly to national prominence in the early 1990s. He upset Martin Luther King III to become chairman of the Fulton County Board of Commissioners, and in 1998, was the unsuccessful Republican nominee for Lieutenant Governor of Georgia. Afterward, he became subjected to a wide-ranging federal corruption investigation of Fulton County government and admitted lying to an FBI agent. He was disbarred, but was later reinstated, as an attorney.

    Corruption investigation:

    Skandalakis, who had returned to county government after his 1998 defeat, became part of a wide-ranging federal investigation into corruption in Fulton County government in April 2000, when the FBI was in investigating payments made to another commissioner. A local businessman, George Greene, confessed to having made payments to other officials as well, including Skandalakis and his chief of staff. Apparently, from September 1997, Skandalakis was paid $5000 a month in legal fees,[20] $75,000 in total.[21] News of the investigation broke in the spring of 2000;[22] by September Skandalakis had sold the family home in Alpharetta, while his family had moved to North Carolina.[23] To an FBI agent Skandalakis denied having voted on matters relating to Green or his company, but “had, in fact, voted in favor of a contract to install a video teleconferencing system on which Sable was a subcontractor.” After a two and a half year investigation, he pled guilty to lying to an FBI agent and was sentenced in 2003 to six months in prison.[20][24] Besides the prison time, Skandalakis was also ordered to pay a $100,000 fine and spend 100 hours in community service.[21] As a result of his conviction, in a unanimous decision by the Georgia Supreme Court in 2005, he was disbarred from practicing law in the state.[25]

    Reinstatement as an attorney:

    After serving his prison sentence, Skandalakis went to work for Waffle House, eventually becoming a vice president dealing with security, risk management and loss prevention. He then sought reinstatement as an attorney.

    The fitness board of the State Bar of Georgia recommended that Skandalakis be allowed to again be admitted as a Georgia attorney after he petitioned for reinstatement in March 2012. Subsequently, on 6 May 2013, the Georgia Supreme Court allowed reinstatement of Skandalakis subject to his again passing the bar examination, the court writing in its opinion that The record shows that since his conviction Skandalakis has shown remorse and has strived to act with integrity and responsibility through his hard work, his devotion to family, and as a volunteer in his community.

    On 30 October 2013, Skandalakis again became a member of the State Bar of Georgia, and continued his post conviction employment as an executive with Waffle House, Inc.[26][27]

  9. Sooooo when the child get COVID the lawsuit will be “they should have told them to wear their mask, it’s mandated!” Gotta pick one! Or just make it make sense smh

  13. If you don’t want your children to wear a mask please stay virtual. You have that choice. You do not have the right to impose your ignorant believes on teachers that are risking their lives to teach your children. It is because of people like you that we can not get rid of this pandemic.

  14. So let me get this straight. You’re mad if the students are virtual and you’re mad if they are in school but have to wear a mask?? Also, how are we teaching them that they are dirty if EVERYONE is wearing a mask to school? No we’re teaching them that we’re in a pandemic right now and that means having to do things that we ordinarily wouldn’t have to do. So either allow them to be virtual and breathe freely at home as they wish or put the dang mask on and go to school. I know they’re probably used to living such privileged lives but you can’t have it your way right now, at least not on this issue. And all this the government is trying to control us nonsense is just plain dumb. The economy has suffered greatly because of this virus and no one in government would dare want that. We all know how they love money. Clearly these parents haven’t been affected or loss a loved one due to covid or they would be singing a different tune. I also bet they are some of the same ones who are against getting the vaccine too.

  15. This is the most idiotic thing. A child “developed cynicism?” Seriously?! I appreciate the efforts of Cobb County to keep my daughter as safe as reasonably possible. These people are ridiculous.

  16. This is why America cannot get the virus under control and we continue to have spikes. The virus is real and deadly. This lawsuit is the equivalent of suing the school district because your kids have to wear clothes to school and can’t show up in a bathing suit or no attire. School staff risk their lives daily and wearing a mask is the least being done to keep them safe.

    • Hey Patrick, here’s an idea for you. Go volunteer at a COVID ICU. Hold the hand of someone who’s dying but do us all a favor and don’t wear a mask. We’ll let COVID make that “live free or die” decision for you.

      Muppet.

  18. This isn’t about the kids. This is about their parents and their Refusal to accept that Covid is not the flu. Suing the school district over this is lunacy. Wear a mask and have your kids wear one. And let’s post the names of these people for all to see.

    • That’s a shame that you would want to cause harm to people because they have a different opinion than you. Giving out someone’s name could cause someone like you to go find them and harm the family

      • Well Joe, if they were worried about their names being filing suit would be a bad idea. It’s public record… Besides it’s just that same crazy lady who had a melt down about virtual school and now she’s having a melt down about face to face learning with a mask. If one of her four kids “can’t breathe” in a mask then perhaps that child should have remained virtual.

  19. Exactly.
    I don’t need for my mother to get sick because some kid at her grandson’s school coughed and spread COVID. Then he brings it home to her.
    Not everyone can be vaccinated due to other health complications.

    Parents should think about other people, not just themselves. Bet one of them is a lawyer, so doing this only takes time, not real money.

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