Des Moines teen says he was arrested after witnessing school fight

Bo James says his son's suspension last year from Des Moines East High School is an example of how schools disproportionately impose out-of-classroom discipline for minority students.

It's a problem the Des Moines school district acknowledges is systemwide, and one it's trying to fix.

The Johnston father is not claiming his son is completely innocent in connection with an altercation outside the school last year.

Instead, he says the district's inconsistent or unreasonable actions led to his son being charged with a felony, taken to a juvenile detention center and treated like a criminal long before his day in court, where video evidence at least partially exonerated him.

“Everything about this was just crazy,” Bo James said. “For one, they started calling these children a gang when, in reality, they were just kids wearing their football jerseys. Would you call a group of white kids wearing their school’s football jerseys a gang?  No.”

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Gerald, then 15, and as many as 200 other students witnessed a fight outside of East High last year involving one of his best friends. The teenager says he was not involved in the physical altercation beyond shouting from the sidelines and at one point pulling his friend away from the fight.

But some witnesses' accounts — including one of the students involved in the fight — indicated that Gerald had punched and kicked another student. That student suffered abrasions and swelling and was taken to a local hospital, but had no serious injuries, a police report shows.

Cellphone video shot by another student and provided to the Register shows the victim getting up from the ground and does not show Gerald striking him.

A Des Moines police officer assigned to the school investigated and, ultimately, James and four other black students were arrested on a felony assault charge.

Bo James said school officials didn’t immediately contact him or his ex-wife following the altercation. The parents didn’t learn of the situation until that evening, when Gerald was not allowed to play in a football game.

School and law enforcement officials also did not warn the family a week later, when a police officer summoned Gerald to the front of a classroom, asked him to turn around and handcuffed him in front of his classmates, the father said.

DATABASES: Review out-of-class disciplinary actions taken by each of Iowa’s public school districts by race and reason action was taken

Gerald was subsequently not allowed to return to the school because of a restraining order prohibiting him from having further contact with the victim. He spent a week in a juvenile detention center because of a “probable cause to believe he committed a delinquent act,” according to documents provided by the James family.

As a result of those restrictions, the teen moved from Des Moines, where he lived with his mother, Buffy Wright, to his father's home in Johnston, where he now attends school.

The felony charge was later dismissed after Gerald signed a consent decree in March admitting to being an accomplice to the assault, a misdemeanor that was removed from his record following six months of probation.

Bo James said school officials — especially the school resource officer — seemed genuinely concerned for his son’s well-being. But, he adds, their actions and recommendations led to punishment far disproportionate to the crime.

His son shouldn’t have followed his friends to the fight, Bo James said. But the school and the court system failed by not considering all the circumstances before pursuing criminal charges, he said.

Bo James said officials ignored such factors as the lack of serious injury, absence of evidence tying Gerald to the fight and his son’s record as an honor roll student with no previous suspensions or criminal charges.

Gerald said spending seven days at Meyer Hall, the juvenile detention center, was humiliating.

“They left a light on when you sleep," he said. "The sink was connected to the toilet and was all metal. The showers were either super hot or super cold. And there was just a little window.”

Gerald says he’s now fitting in better at Johnston, but he endured a difficult year while dealing with his legal matters, making new friends and adjusting to new teachers and classes. His grade point average initially fell, too.

Buffy Wright described her son's suspension as a "breakdown" for her, her family and the school system. Multiple generations of her family are East High graduates, took pride in the district and felt its support, she said. The family was shocked by what she sees as a failure within the school system.

"I am sad," Wright said. "I wanted him to graduate from here, but that's not going to happen. It's not fair."

Des Moines school officials declined to comment about the specifics of the September 2014 fight, citing student confidentiality laws.

Jake Troja, an employee overseeing the district’s effort to reduce out-of-class discipline, said the district recognizes that black students have disproportionately been subjected to such punishment and is trying to address the problem.

The district removed from class about 16 percent of its black students at least once during the 2014-2015 school year, state statistics show. About 6 percent of white students were removed.

Troja agreed with Bo James on several points, including the need to improve “cultural proficiency” among staff so that minority students' actions aren’t interpreted differently or don't trigger disproportionate punishment.

“The greatest thing we’re working on is a system of checks and balances so those biases can’t occur,” Troja said.