Case 4:25-cv-00239-O Document 1 Filed 03/11/25 Page 1 of 7 PageID 1

IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT OF TEXAS
FORT WORTH DIVISION

D.H., by and through his next §

friend, ALEXIS F., §
§
Plaintiff, §
§
v. § CIVIL ACTION NO. 4:25-cv-239
§
HURST-EULESS-BEDFORD §
INDEPENDENT SCHOOL DISTRICT, §
§
Defendant. §

ORIGINAL COMPLAINT

I. INTRODUCTION

1. This is a civil action brought pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 12132 and 29 U.S.C. § 794

to seek redress in the form of monetary relief in the form of economic and non-economic

damages for Defendant’s wrongful actions in discriminating against Plaintiff on the basis of his

disability. This action also seeks attorneys’ fees for time spent in representing Plaintiff in the

proceeding below and in litigating the instant Complaint.

II. JURISDICTION

2. This Court has jurisdiction pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 12132, 28 U.S.C. §§ 1331 and

1343, and 29 U.S.C. § 794.

3. Venue is appropriate in this judicial district under 28 U.S.C. § 1391(b) because

the events that give rise to this Complaint occurred in this district.

III. PARTIES

4. Plaintiff D.H. is an eighteen-year-old student with disabilities who lives with his

mother and next friend, Alexis F., in or around Bedford, Texas. He resides within the

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geographical area served by the Hurst-Euless-Bedford Independent School District (“HEB

ISD”). Alexis F. has a durable power of attorney for D.H. which grants her authority to

prosecute this litigation on behalf of D.H.

5. Defendant HEB ISD is a duly incorporated Independent School District located in

Tarrant County. HEB ISD is the resident school district for D.H.

IV. STATEMENT OF FACTS

6. D.H. is an eighteen-year-old student who resides in or around Bedford, Texas. He

was enrolled in the HEB ISD at the Trinity High School campus during the 2023-2024 school

year and is currently enrolled there during the 2024-2025 school year. HEB ISD has

recognized Plaintiff as eligible for special education instruction and services by virtue of the

categories of Autism, Intellectual Disability, and Speech Impairment. Plaintiff is non-verbal.

7. Plaintiff receives special education instruction and services from HEB ISD in a

Personal Academics and Language Support (“PALS”) classroom—a restrictive, self-contained

classroom designed for the provision of services to students receiving special education services.

8. Plaintiff transitioned from junior high school to high school for the 2023-2024

school year. The transition was difficult for Plaintiff, in large part because the staff members

working with him lacked experience or appropriate training. He was placed in a room separate

from other students as a result. Right from the start of the 2023-2024 school year, therefore,

HEB ISD began placing punitive restrictions and conditions on Plaintiff due to its own

inadequacies and failures, rather than as part of any appropriate educational program designed to

address his actual needs. Simultaneously with this complaint, Plaintiff is filing an administrative

due process complaint under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (the “IDEA”) to

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address the failure by HEB ISD to provide him a Free Appropriate Public Education. With this

complaint, Plaintiff seeks damages remedies not available under the IDEA.

9. Almost immediately, it became apparent that HEB ISD was not only failing to

address Plaintiff’s educational needs, but was placing him in degrading, inhuman, and unsafe

conditions and circumstances. Plaintiff recounts non-exhaustive examples of these conditions

and circumstances. However, the allegations below only present examples of such conditions

and circumstances. On information and belief, HEB ISD engaged in impermissible acts and

omissions prior to the first of the examples presented and continues to do so even now. The fact

that Plaintiff’s mother observed dried feces under his fingernails when he came home from

school on September 6, 2023, gives rise to the reasonable inference that Defendant’s wrongdoing

began right from the start of the 2023-2024 school year.

10. As early as September 13, 2023, HEB ISD teachers and staff not only allowed

Plaintiff to elope into a busy parking lot after having been left unattended in the hallway, but

they began using illegal restraints on Plaintiff, causing him not only physical injury, but also

intense stress, anxiety, and frustration. Bewildered and anguished by this treatment, Plaintiff

began ripping off his clothes and engaging in self-injury, including but not limited to beating

himself on the head.

11. Far from taking Plaintiff’s physical and mental injuries seriously, HEB ISD

teachers and staff either ignored them or even made light of them. They did not engage in any

constructive actions to address them or to correct their own failures. For example, on September

29, 2023, Defendant’s teachers and staff allowed Plaintiff to wander around this separate room

completely naked, simply watching him and doing nothing either to assist him in reclothing

himself or to do anything constructive for him or with him at all. Plaintiff engaged in serious

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self-injurious behavior during this time period without any intervention or even expression of

interest by teachers and staff. On the contrary, teachers and staff sat in the room laughing and

engaged in personal activities on their cellular telephones.

12. Over the next few weeks, this behavior continued. Ironically, on the same day,

October 3, 2023, that Plaintiff’s mother met with HEB ISD administrators and staff to discuss

Plaintiff’s recent elopement activity—activity stemming from Plaintiff’s poor treatment at

school—Plaintiff was again walking around the room without clothing, pausing to urinate on the

floor, while teachers and staff took no action to intervene, to redirect Plaintiff into any positive

action, or to assist him in any way. Far from developing a plan to address these degrading

spectacles, HEB ISD allowed it to continue day after day until late October 2023. Ultimately,

Plaintiff was left at times so exposed to his own feces and urine that he developed sores as a

result. During this time period Defendant continued its dismissive approach in other ways as

well. For example, on October 24, 2023, for example, HEB ISD teachers and staff allowed

Plaintiff to chew on a gel-filled pineapple-shaped toy, despite the fact that his mother had made

clear that such a toy would constitute a choking hazard for Plaintiff.

13. On November 16, 2023, HEB ISD teachers and staff left craft items, such as

crayons, accessible to Plaintiff, despite knowing full well that his access to such items was

extremely dangerous, given his tendency to place items of this sort into his mouth. When

Plaintiff predictably followed his tendency in this regard, teachers and staff compounded their

failures by implementing impermissible and illegal physical restraints on him.

14. On January 11, 2024, HEB ISD teachers and staff left pecans accessible to

Plaintiff, despite having been made aware of his nut allergies. He began eating them and

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suffered a predictable allergic reaction. These and other examples of wantonly deliberate

indifference recurred day after day.

15. Far from reacting appropriately to the fully justified expressions of concern by

Plaintiff’s mother by correcting its failures and instilling its teachers and staff with an

appropriate understanding of and respect for the human dignity of Plaintiff and other students in

their charge, HEB ISD instead placed Plaintiff’s mother on a “communication plan,” severely

restricting her ability to communicate with its teachers and staff. This action reinforced its own

failures and the disrespect for Plaintiff’s dignity underlying those failures.

16. So dramatic have Plaintiff’s anxieties and frustrations become of late that he has

been showing clear signs of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (“PTSD”). Recognizing this

development, HEB ISD indicated it would send help to transition Plaintiff from the car to the

school because of the panic he was showing at the prospect of entering the school. However, the

school district has generally failed to provide any assistance in this regard. In fact, when school

district staff members have approached in these circumstances they have failed to follow

appropriate protocols and have made the situation worse, causing Plaintiff’s mental state to

deteriorate and jeopardizing his physical safety in the process.

17. Because Defendant has not taken responsibility for these failures and their

foundation in Defendant’s impermissible and degraded perspective towards Plaintiff, Plaintiff

has no alternative but to seek the intervention of this Court.

FIRST CAUSE OF ACTION (ADA)

18. Plaintiff incorporates by reference paragraphs 1-17 of this Complaint.

19. HEB ISD is a public entity within the meaning of that term under Title II of the
ADA.

20. Plaintiff is a qualified individual with a disability under the ADA.

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21. HEB ISD’s acts and omissions constitute unlawful discrimination under 42

U.S.C. § 12132 by failing to make Defendant’s programs and services available to Plaintiff and,

in fact, by using mechanisms in making such programs and services unavailable that had the

predictable effect of causing significant physical and mental injury to Plaintiff.

22. HEB ISD’s acts and omissions constitute intentional discrimination in that it has

intentionally excluded Plaintiff from the services it provides by willfully exposing Plaintiff to

degrading and inhuman conditions and circumstances, which compromised his human dignity,

his mental health, and his physical safety.

23. Plaintiff has suffered substantial injuries because of Defendant’s intentional

discrimination and is entitled to monetary relief.

SECOND CAUSE OF ACTION (SECTION 504)

24. Plaintiff incorporates by reference paragraphs 1-23 of this Complaint.

25. Plaintiff is a “disabled/handicapped” individual as defined in 29 U.S.C. § 705.

26. Plaintiff has been denied and excluded from significant benefits of Defendant’s

program which would have, if properly designed and implemented for Plaintiff, allowed him to

avail himself of its services and programs.

27. Defendant receives federal financial assistance in implementing its programs.

28. Defendant’s level of deliberate indifference, bad faith, and gross misjudgment in

failing to provide a safe environment for Plaintiff with respect for his human dignity to avail

himself of its programs and services was and continues to be sufficiently egregious to constitute

discrimination under Section 504.

29. As a direct and proximate result of Defendant’s unlawful discrimination, Plaintiff

has suffered and continues to suffer substantial injuries.

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PRAYER

To remedy Defendant’s wrongdoing as articulated above, Plaintiff respectfully requests

the following:

• Monetary damages in compensation for Defendant’s wrongdoing based on

both economic and non-economic injuries; and

• Payment for Plaintiff’s reasonable and necessary attorneys’ fees and costs

of the suit.

DATED: March 11, 2025 Respectfully Submitted,

___/s/ Mark Whitburn_______

Mark Whitburn
State Bar No. 24042144
Sean Pevsner
State Bar No. 24079130
Whitburn & Pevsner, PLLC
2000 E. Lamar Blvd., Suite 600
Arlington, Texas 76006
Tel: (817) 653-4547
Fax: (817) 653-4477
[email protected]