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Loading ...Lawsuit: Anti-gay bullying led to son’s death
04.02.2009 4:23pm EDT
(Mentor, Ohio) The parents of an Ohio High School student say their son would be alive today if the school had prevented bullies from tormenting him.
In a federal lawsuit the parents of Eric Mohat allege that he regularly was called ‘gay,’ ‘fag,’ ‘queer’ and ‘homo’ among other names and that the school did nothing to prevent it.“This harassment and bullying took the form of constant name-calling, teasing and verbal intimidation in one particular class and constant pushing, shoving and hitting both in class and in hallways of the high school,” court papers say.
The lawsuit names the school district, administrators Jacqueline A. Hoynes and Joseph Spiccia, and math teacher Thomas M. Horvath. All have declined comment in the case.
Mohat, 17 at the time, went home from school on March 27, 2007, put a gun to his head and pulled the trigger.
“On the day Eric committed suicide, one of the students who had been harassing him said to Eric, in front of other students and, by information and belief, in front of defendant Horvath, ‘Why don’t you go home and shoot yourself? No one would miss you,’” the lawsuit said.
“The defendants knew or should have known about this constant harassment,” the lawsuit claims. “Defendant Horvath knew about the harassment because most of the verbal harassment and some of the physical harassment took place in his classroom during a math class that he taught and because Eric complained to him about the harassment.”
“When you lose a child like this it destroys you in ways you can’t even describe,” Eric Mohat’s father, Willaim Mohat, told ABC News.
The lawsuit does not seek punitive damages. Instead it wants the school district to recognize the suicide as the result of homophobia and for the district to implement an anti-bullying program to prevent other similar tragedies.
The Mohats claim that three other students at the school committed suicide in 2007.
A study by GLSEN, the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network, found that 47 percent of junior/middle high school students identified bullying, name-calling or harassment as somewhat serious or very serious problems at their school.
Additionally, 69 percent of junior/middle high school students reported being assaulted or harassed in the previous year and only 41 percent said they felt very safe at school.
>Ohio won’t do a thing.
Just like the prediction in this web site that judges in Northern Florida would *never* rule for a GLESN club in a high school?
Don’t be so quick to shut the door on the possibility of progress, even in Red states…hang in there….
Anti-bullying programs are actually gaining steam across the country. This isn’t so out of the mainstream as it might appear at a first glance.
Even though the parents have not asked for punitive or any other damages, I hope the jury takes the initiative to hit the school district and the math teacher Horvath (homophobia horvath) with huge punitive damages for pain and suffering and show these jerks it is not going to be tolerated. If this were to be the standard across the country, the rate would drop off a cliff, because people understand MONEY.
We need a national anti-bullying legislation for the entire country for BGLT people. I come from a small town in Ohio and the bullies were horrible. The school did nothing. The teachers do nothing. And the police do nothing. It’s time they were taught to do something. Light a fire under their asses!
I love how the staff member’s/teacher’s names re mentioned in the article. I wish they would happen upon this site and be humiliated by seeing their full names posted. I had this one skinhead guy assault me once and he called me slurs almost everyday and it was allowed. They protect the rights of the bigots but if you’re gay they turn a blind eye.
If this happened here in Canada, there would be a public inquiry. When is America going to protect the rights of its gay citizens!!??
@ Michael–I can’t help but laugh, especially because it’s true.
@ Morgan–Well…let’s recall that Shaker was originally covered by a restrictive covenant. No Catholics, no Jews, no blacks. There was a black mortician who had a house on Lee Road, the geographic (not commercial) center of Shaker, and he was forced out because of his inconvenient skin color. Yes, Shaker did redeem itself, but a large number of the white liberals who lived there have moved much further east and southeast.
PS–Morgan, it wasn’t downtown you were thankful to be far from 42 years ago. It was Central, where four housing projects face each other. You see, unlike Southern cities, Cleveland had restrictive covenants and informal agreements which kept blacks in Central and a few other East Side neighborhoods. Those informal agreements are the reason that Cleveland was the case study for the Fair Housing Act.
But Eric Mohat is what–who–matters here. The more I think about it, I’d like to see the bullies named and shamed. It shouldn’t take much to find out who these “men” are and post it online. Let their lives be ruined. Let them have a dose of their own medicine ’til they can’t take it. Co-workers who shun them for being such losers. Friends who are too embarrassed to be seen with them. As much as the Mohats have had to hurt, let the families of the bullies explain how their little angels hounded another kid to shoot himself. But then, somehow I don’t think any of this is really what the Mohats would want, and maybe it’s better to think before acting and show some humanity, than it is to be all vengeful.
Hey Morgan… before you knock West Virginia, I want you to consider something.
1) West Virginia does not have a state constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage, but Ohio does.
2) West Virginia is about to adopt a non-discrimination act on sexual orienation. Ohio hasn’t done that, and even with Governor Strickland in office, it’s unlikely that Ohio will adopt such an act any time soon.
This was the story of my life. I’m lucky to be here. I’m so glad people are standing up for what is right.
My best years were at my local school in the then very nice, peaceful and calm suburbs of Shaker Heights thankfully away from the downtown of Cleveland, Ohio. My time there as a young boy up to 43 years ago when I left for the suburbs of DC atage 12 wss very nice compared to my life as a teenager in school in my new area. How many time did I long to go back to the life I had in Shaker Heights, noone bothered me in school there compared to the bullying I received in my Maryland school. But, I had left my old life behind and with Ohio the way it is now antigay marriage amendment and all even thought the current gov there is a gay-friendly Democrat Strickland who replaced an antigay GOP gov Taft. The marriage amendment was voted in before Strickland took office so there is little he can currently do about that. Iowa may be changing, but not Ohio.
The MD county I live in is next to the vibrantly progay city DC. So I am glad years later that I made the move. Maryland may see civil unions sometime while New Jersey may very well move from civil unions to marriage later this very year. New Jersey is almost our neighbor.
And West Virginia is all that separates Maryland from Ohio. But WV is quite a barrier, mountains, culture etc. as we know. I believe Iowa will much more of an impact on the Midwest than Maryland could.
Iowa is near Illinois and Illinois is a corrupt state as we’ve heard again and again but maybe Iowa will rub off in Illinois more than it could Ohio. Indiana thanks to a few brave progay politicians in the right place in its statehouse has shot down repeated attempts to bring a constitutional amendment to its state. I hear from Equality Indiana about what’s going on there, so Indiana is blessed with an active gay rights org.
But meanwhile I am going back to read the headline here that the “Iowa Supreme Court strikes down gay marriage ban”. On the surface this is good news but I will now read the full article.