Teen Beating Suspect Sues For Right To Education
The Florida boy charged with stomping on a girl's head claims he's being cheated out of an education while in jail.
Lawyers for 16-year-old Wayne Treacy filed a lawsuit Wednesday against the Broward County School Board and the Sheriff's Office.
Treacy was charged as an adult with attempted murder in the March 17 attack of Deerfield Beach Middle School student Josie Lou Ratley who was left with brain damage following the assault.
In the lawsuit, lawyers said Treacy is getting less than five hours a week of instruction as he awaits trial on an attempted murder charge for the attack. But the South Florida Sun-Sentinel reports that school district records show he's getting just under 30 hours a week.
School Superintendent Jim Notter said he'll look into the claim. The Broward Sheriff's Office declined to comment.
The lawsuit requests 25 hours of instruction per week. It questions whether juvenile inmates who are charged as adults, such as Treacy, are getting the schooling they're entitled to.
During the investigation, Treacy conceded that he rode a bike to the school to confront Ratley after receiving a text message from her phone telling him to "go visit" his dead brother.
His older brother's body was found hanging from a tree in front of a church in October. Treacy told psychologist Michael Brannon when he received the text message, "an explosion went off inside" and he put on his brother's clothes and steel-toe boots, which he used to kick Ratley in the head.
After the attack, Ratley spent much of her six-week hospitalization in a medically induced coma. The teenager has appeared in public and is recovering.
