A mother filed a lawsuit alleging sexual abuse and extreme racial bullying of her Black daughter at Northwest Side School.
During a Wednesday press conference, Sherron Hinton said that over three years, her daughter, who is one of the few Black students at Wildwood IB World Magnet School, suffered from repeated, race-based bullying and harassment from her classmates and was even sexually abused by a teacher.
Mother Files Lawsuit Alleging Abuse and Bullying of Black Daughter
However, she said that the school failed to take appropriate action to protect her daughter, adding that when staffers determined the student posed a risk for self-harm, they did not inform her mother about the situation.
The lawsuit was filed against Chicago Public Schools and staff from the Northwest Side School and alleges that Hinton's daughter suffered "extreme acts" of racial bullying and sexual abuse. She added that no school can be considered high-performing if it crushes the spirit of Black children to keep its rankings.
The lawsuit that the mother filed in Cook County circuit court names the Chicago Board of Education and four Wildwood staffers as the defendants. A spokesperson for CPS said that the district is committed to the safety and well-being of its students, according to WTTW.
Hinto's daughter is referred to in the lawsuit under the pseudonym "Jenny," who is said to have suffered from abuse from 2022 to 2025 when she was in the 5th, 6th, and 7th grades. The lawsuit adds that from the student's first day of classes three years ago, she was subjected to an "escalating campaign" of verbal and physical harassment.
Jenny was said to have been body shamed, called the N-word, encouraged to harm herself, and physically abused by her fellow students. She wrote in a classroom questionnaire in November 2022 that she felt like she was going to die.
The School's Failure To Address the Issue
The lawsuit also claims that despite repeated attempts to get the school to make efforts to improve the situation, the abuse continued and even got worse. Hinton claims that her daughter did not fall through the cracks but was placed in them, ABC7 Chicago reported.
The mother added that the harm that her daughter suffered in school was not hidden, noting that it was documented. She said that they saw the signs and had the reports, but still did not do anything to protect the student.
Attorney Cass Casper of the Disparti Law Group said that one example of harassment that Jenny experienced was being called the N-word by other students. They apparently used school computers to do this behind her back, as per CBS News.
