Bolingbrook HS Staffers Forced Disabled Teen to Clean Blood, Tissue Paper From Restroom Floor: Lawsuit

The parents of a mentally and physically disabled teen filed a lawsuit accusing Bolingbrook High School staffers of forcing their daughter to "mop up" blood and clean tissue paper off a restroom floor.

Gregory and Lisa McNeal, the parents of Jada McNeal, filed the lawsuit in Will County court.

Jada, now 16, is "physically and mentally handicapped with cerebral palsy, has "the mental capacity of an 8-year-old," is "bound to a wheelchair outside of the home," is "required to wear a diaper while at school," is "legally blind in her left eye" and "requires a personal assistant ... while attending life skills education classes at school," the lawsuit said.

In February 2013, Jada "needed her menstrual pad and diaper changed with the assistance of paraprofessional" Susan Krueger, the lawsuit said. The suit identified Krueger as a Bolingbrook High School "teacher or teacher's aide."

Krueger and another teacher or teacher's aide, Melissa Soncek, "assisted Jada in the washroom and helped her change out of a soiled menstrual pad and diaper and assisted in her putting on a news menstrual pad and diaper," the suit said.

After they left the restroom, a third teacher or teacher's aide, Lauren Hughes, "informed Jada she had made a mess in the washroom, that she left tissue paper in and around the toilet, that she left blood in and around the toilet, and that she was required to clean up both the tissue paper and blood," the lawsuit said.

Hughes "then physically threatened the wheelchair-bound mentally and physically disabled minor that she would 'lock her in the bathroom is she ran over another person's foot with her wheelchair,'" the suit said.

The three staffers "knew that requiring a physically and mentally disabled wheelchair-bound minor to mop up blood would be potentially dangerous and traumatizing to persons such as (Jada) and knew that by forcing her to clean up blood with no protective clothing" they were violating federal health and safety laws, the lawsuit said.

Gregory and Lisa McNeal named Hughes, Kruger and Soncek, as well as Valley View School District and Bolingbrook High School, as defendants in their lawsuit.

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