Teen sues Alpena Public Schools over failure to protect him from teacher’s sexual abuse

An Alpena County teenager is suing the school district, teachers and administrators he says failed to protect him from being sexually abused by his former special education teacher.

Attorneys for the youth filed a complaint in U.S. District Court at the start of the month that alleges Alpena Public Schools and four district employees knowingly stood by while teacher Heather Winfield groomed the boy for abuse between 2016 and 2018 at Thunder Bay Junior High School. He was 11 to 13 years old at the time.

Attorneys for the teen say the damage done to their client is both devastating and lasting. And they say it’s something the school could and should have prevented.

“The statute in Michigan case law says that the school district has a duty to protect the student from sexual harassment once they knew or should have known of the sexual harassment occurring,” attorney Zach Runyan said. “They can’t bury their head in the sand to try to avoid liability.”

Teacher convicted on one of seven charges

Prosecutors charged Winfield in 2019 with multiple sex offenses, including first-degree criminal sexual conduct. That charge carries a penalty of up to life in prison upon conviction.

A jury in 2021 acquitted her of five of those charges. She was convicted of one count of accosting a child for immoral purposes. A seventh charge was dismissed by the presiding judge.

The youth did not sue Winfield in the federal lawsuit. The complaint names as defendants Alpena Public Schools; former Principal Steven Genschaw; human resources director Justin Gluesing; Assistant Principal Jean Kowalski; and teacher Julie Kieliszewski. None of those employees is currently working at Thunder Bay.

Stress, humiliation and mental anguish

The lawsuit claims that Alpena Public Schools and the staffers named as defendants failed to protect the youth from a sexually hostile educational environment, citing rights and protections he should have received under the Elliott-Larsen Civil Rights Act, Title IX and the 14th Amendment.

It also accuses the defendants of failing to report what was going on in accordance with Michigan’s child protection laws.

The plaintiff’s attorneys say the stress, humiliation and mental anguish the teen experienced at school stymied his ability to receive an education and could permanently affect his personal and professional life.

Alpena Public Schools would not comment on ongoing litigation. One defendant said he would not comment given that he had not yet been served the complaint. Three others could not be reached or did not respond to requests for comment.

Winfield was convicted on one of seven charges

The youth in the lawsuit alleges that Winfield sexually assaulted him on at least 100 occasions both on and off school property.

Winfield was convicted of accosting a child for immoral purposes — trying to get someone younger than 16 years old to have sex or commit an act of gross indecency, according to Michigan law.

A judge sentenced her to serve nine months in jail. She’s now a registered sex offender on probation.

She was acquitted on five charges: two counts of first-degree criminal sexual assault with a child under 13; one count of first-degree criminal sexual conduct during the commission of a felony; one count of third-degree criminal sexual conduct with a child 13-15; and second-degree criminal sexual conduct with a child under 13.

Winfield’s former attorney thinks the fact she was found not guilty of five of the seven original charges and one was dropped means the civil litigation is unlikely to be successful.

“The fact that the jury has spoken in that way suggests to us that (plaintiff’s attorney) is going to have difficulty proving his civil case against the school and these other administrators,” said Winfield’s attorney Daniel White.

Prosecutors in criminal court must prove beyond a reasonable doubt that a crime was committed. In civil court, the bar is lower: A plaintiff must show that the “preponderance of evidence” indicates wrongdoing in order to collect damages.

Complaint says school ignored red flags

Of prime importance in proceedings to come — attorneys for the plaintiff have requested a jury trial — will be what school administrators and a fellow teacher knew about Winfield’s relationship with the teen and when they decided to do something about it.

The lawsuit alleges school employees knew Winfield was spending an excessive amount of time with the plaintiff outside of school hours, including driving him home, buying him fast food and ice cream and even taking him on a trip to Disney World during spring break.

Winfield allowed the plaintiff and his friends to violate school protocols by spending time in her classroom during “adviser time,” made inappropriate comments to him and texted the student on his personal phone, “giggling like a schoolgirl,” according to the lawsuit.

The lawsuit alleges that a teacher at the school observed Winfield texting the boy emojis representing ejaculating penises.

“I don't think anybody could realistically say that the school did not have a duty to do something once they were aware of that type of information,” said Runyan.

After students reported what they viewed as an inappropriate relationship between Winfield and the boy, Thunder Bay’s former assistant principal — one of the named defendants in the lawsuit — met with Winfield and told her the relationship had crossed a line.

But the assistant principal did not contact police or put any protections in place for the student. Instead, according to the lawsuit, she didn’t push the issue with only one month left in the school year.

‘They waited too long’

When school recommenced, Winfield attended the boy’s football practices, though she didn’t have a child on the team, the complaint alleges. At games, parents noticed Winfield’s behavior; she would ogle the boy and on at least one occasion, stripped his shirt off.

Partway through the fall semester, a student provided school administrators with messages between Winfield and the plaintiff that, according to the lawsuit, contained explicitly sexual content, including jokes about Winfield showing up to school naked.

“Rather than immediately terminate Winfield, Defendants allowed Winfield to take paid leave while they ‘investigated’ the messages,” the complaint says.

Winfield eventually resigned from her teaching position. The lawsuit asserts that the plaintiff was subjected to constant harassment from other students due to his past and continuing inappropriate relationship with Winfield.

“They waited too long,” said Runyan. “If they would have done something to nip this in the bud when they first were getting reports that people were concerned about the relationship … they might have been able to put a stop to this before Winfield had the opportunity to sexually abuse our client.”

Jennifer Brookland covers child welfare for the Detroit Free Press in partnership with Report for America. Reach her at jbrookland@freepress.com.

This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Alpena Public Schools sued over failure to protect boy from sex abuse