‘Obvious blind spots:’ KC district didn’t protect student killed at school, lawsuit says
The mother of a 14-year-old who was stabbed to death by a fellow student in a middle school bathroom is suing Kansas City Public Schools, alleging officials failed to address violent threats made against her son and ignored security shortfalls.
Vicenta Guzman, whose son Manuel “Manny” Guzman was killed in April 2022, claims the school district negligently allowed a knife to be brought into Northeast Middle School. Her attorneys have filed a civil petition seeking damages for wrongful death under Missouri law.
The lawsuit, which was filed Monday in Jackson County Circuit Court, says KCPS failed to protect Manny Guzman when employees “knew that another student was threatening to stab” him at school. Officials knew or should have known of the student’s “history of violence on campus,” the lawyers wrote.
It also references “dangerously defective metal detectors” and “obvious blind spots” that school officials were allegedly aware of before Manny Guzman was killed. The lawsuit says “proper and adequate measures were not in place” to keep weapons out.
KCPS is named as the sole defendant. A district spokesperson did not immediately respond to The Star’s request for comment Tuesday afternoon.
Around 9 a.m. on April 12, 2022, police officers responded to a reported cutting inside the school at 4904 Independence Ave. in Kansas City’s South Indian Mound neighborhood. Manny Guzman was taken to the hospital with serious injuries, where he was later pronounced dead, and police took a fellow student into custody that day.
The killing, which captured the attention of public officials, including Kansas City Mayor Quinton Lucas, touched off protests and a class walkout last year as questions circulated over how a student could be killed in a place with strict security.
Students pass through metal detectors daily. They are also required to carry clear backpacks, which are routinely searched.
Then-Superintendent Mark Bedell described the killing as devastating for KCPS employees and students. He also said the death of Manny Guzman had prompted the district to review its security protocols.
In earlier interviews with The Star, six friends and family members said Manny Guzman and the student who stabbed him had previous altercations. Vicenta Guzman said her son had recently been in a fight with him that was recorded and broadcast over social media.
“Manny won that fight. It was a fair fight,” she told The Star during an interview last year. “And I guess, social media, Snapchat, started to make it really big to where I feel, I don’t know, where this young man wasn’t willing to take that loss of a fight and took his life.”
The fellow student was initially charged with first-degree murder and armed criminal action. In April, on the eve of the killing’s one-year anniversary, the youth pleaded guilty to voluntary manslaughter — an outcome disapproved by members of the Guzman family.
In May, a judge committed the teenager to the Division of Youth Services. The state agency is responsible for providing treatment and rehabilitation programs to Missouri children who come through the juvenile justice system.
The Star’s Sarah Ritter contributed to this report.
