Teacher handcuffed: School board accused of stifling debate

KAPLAN, La. – Louisiana’s attorney general has filed a lawsuit accusing a local school board of stifling public debate at a meeting in January disrupted by the video-recorded arrest of a teacher being handcuffed on a hallway floor.

Attorney General Jeff Landry’s lawsuit accuses the Vermilion Parish School Board of violating the state’s Open Meetings Law at its meeting Jan. 8 in which a teacher criticized a district superintendent’s pay raise.

Teacher Deyshia Hargrave, whose arrest sparked outrage after the video spread online, called the suit good news for “anyone who speaks at public meetings.”

It asks a court to nullify the meeting’s voted pay raise for the superintendent.

One board member who opposed the raise applauded the suit. Others declined to comment or didn’t answer messages.