Editor’s note: This story includes graphic, racist and homophobic language.
A lawsuit was filed Thursday against Pueblo School District 60 and the principal of an elementary school for one 12-year-old girl’s years of racial bullying and harassment.
The bullying got so bad that stress sent her to the hospital for emergency stomach surgery and left her years behind in reading and math. This was despite repeated requests by her mother, Salina Cummings, to the school and district to stop the verbal and physical abuse from other students.
The lawsuit alleges racial discrimination based on Title VI, which prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, color, and national origin.
It also alleges sex discrimination based on Title IX and includes a third equal protection claim alleging the racial hostility Jaleigha'Nisa, who is Black and Mexican, experienced was so severe and pervasive, it deprived her of equal educational opportunities.
“They were telling me to go back to Africa and eat chicken off the ground and calling me the N- word, and also threatening to hang me and shoot me in my sleep,” said Jaleigha'Nisa softly.
She doesn’t like to talk about the time she was enrolled at Columbian Elementary School.
The lawsuit alleges that Pueblo 60 showed “deliberate indifference” to the racist abuse and harassment of Jaleigha'Nisa by failing to adequately investigate, discipline, and take remedial steps to protect her. It calls Columbian principal Jimmie Pool’s conduct shocking.
“Defendants should be held accountable so that no other student in the school district should ever have to suffer the same way,” said the lawsuit.
Pueblo 60 School District has not yet reviewed the lawsuit.
The district has policies on non-discrimination, harassment and bullying, which require schools to conduct timely investigation and resolve of complaints. Under federal law, schools are required to protect students from racial and sex discrimination.
The suit filed against the Pueblo 60 School District alleges constant bullying
Jaleigha'Nisa transferred to Columbian Elementary in fourth-grade, after being bullied by peers in three other schools. At one of those schools a student threatened to stab and kill her.
Within a few weeks at Columbian, which last year had nine Black students out of the school’s 333, classmates were hurling racial slurs at her in person and on social media. Students threatened to stab and kill Jaleigha'Nisa and burn her to death in her sleep. They punched her.
They called her “dyke,” “N—” and “porch monkey” and slapped her across the face, according to the lawsuit. Once the school issued a “no contact contract” between students when Jaleigha'Nisa fought back once when a student threatened to hurt Jaleigha'Nisa’s younger sister.
Cummings, Jaleigha'Nisa’s mother, went to the school repeatedly to report incidents to the school officials and to members of the school board. She said principal Pool would either downplay the incidents or promise he would talk to the children tormenting Jaleigha'Nisa.
“I was up there literally every single day, every day trying to get Mr. Pool to do something about it,” said Salina Cummings, Jaleigha'Nisa's mom.
She said there was never mediation and none of the students engaged in bullying her daughter were ever reprimanded.
When harassment takes place, schools are required to investigate
“They have to investigate and respond once they have proper knowledge of this type of racist and sexist harassment and bullying taking place, which did not happen here,” said attorney Iris Halpern, who is also overseeing a lawsuit alleging race discrimination against the Douglas County School District. “The school did not even investigate until I got involved.”
Schools don’t have to immediately suspend a child but they have to convey to the harassing student and their family that further discriminatory conduct will have consequences that will escalate if it’s not stopped.
But for Jaleigha'Nisa, according to the lawsuit, because there was little to no follow through on investigating events, the threats and violence escalated.
“I was really stressed out and so nervous...and feeling insecure about myself,” said Jaleigha'Nisa, who talks haltingly in a quiet voice.
When she started fifth grade in 2023-24, the racial bullying from at least 11 students continued. They called her racial slurs and threatened to jump Jaleigha'Nisa, shoot her, hang her and come to her house to hurt her.
Cummings said the school dismissed the racial harassment as “roasting,” — where people ridicule each other, escalating the cruelty with each verbal or social media jab.
“I don't know how any school can say whether you're calling it a game or not, that students are allowed to escalate racist comments and threats with each other,” said Halpern. “It's not a game.”
The Pueblo 60 School District failed to respond, the lawsuit says
Cummings reported names of the students to school officials and showed screen shots from other students. She asked for mediation with other families of problematic students but the district denied her requests, according to the lawsuit. It alleged the school district never engaged in a formal investigation of the numerous complaints she and witnesses routinely reported.
Cummings couldn’t understand why the situation was falling on deaf ears.
“Why is she at 11 and 10 years old having to go through so much and you guys are letting her voice and her cries go unheard to where it's physically damaging her? Not only that, but mentally damaging her and it's also affecting her education.”
Jaleigha'Nisa, a silent and introverted child, often broke down in tears. Her grades plummeted to all F’s. She didn’t want to go to school. She was anxious and withdrawn. Her self-confidence evaporated. She told her mom that didn’t want to be Black anymore.
“There’s a loss of respect for one's own identity and history, which I know was very important to (Salina Cummings) that her children be proud of their race,” said Halpern.
Research shows that harassment and bullying in children and youth will have lifelong impacts on physical and mental health, earning capacity, and the ability to build networks and relationships with other children.
“It has a whole slew of adverse ramifications that lasts for many, many years, some of which may never even be recoverable,” Halpern said.
As a result of bullying and harassment, Jaleigha'Nisa was hospitalized from stress
In October 2023, Jaleigha'Nisa, in severe pain with a 103.5-degree temperature, had to undergo emergency surgery, which her pediatrician said was due to stress affecting her gastrointestinal tract. The racial bullying and violent threats continued.
When it was evident the school wasn’t protecting her daughter, Cummings reached out to community groups for help, like the NAACP and the Pueblo Human Relations Commission. At a meeting with school administrators, principal Pool said that he had spoken to individual students over the school year but felt it “did not rise to the level of the same techniques used in conflict resolution.” School administrators insisted they were investigating and disciplining students.
A doctor recommended Jaleigha'Nisa be removed from Columbian because of the stress and trauma she endured at the school and that it posed a risk to her safety and well-being. In January 2024, following a formal complaint from Cummings who had obtained a lawyer, the district conducted an investigation that the lawsuit alleges downplayed allegations of racial discrimination, cast doubts on Jaleigha'Nisa’s credibility, implied that Cumming’s complaints were not long-standing, and dismissed the severity of the racial bullying suffered by Jaleigha'Nisa.
The lawsuit is asking for relief for damages caused by physical, emotional and economic harm as a result of the discrimination suffered by Jaleigha'Nisa.
Cummings said her daughter is doing better at her new school, but is still far behind in reading and math and has been placed on a special education plan. Jaleigha'Nisa has therapy twice a week to address severe trauma.
Jaleigha'Nisa said she hopes the lawsuit will give other children more protection.
“Other Black or mixed kids, in case they're going through something, I want them to know it's OK to stand up for yourself and talk about it.”
