## Facts

- Five current and former Jewish students alleged years of persistent anti-Semitic bullying and harassment by other students in a public school district.
- Alleged conduct included repeated slurs (e.g., “Kike,” “Christ killer,” “dirty Jew”), Holocaust taunts and threats (e.g., references to ovens and “ashes”), and other anti-Jewish statements.
- Students allegedly encountered swastikas and other Nazi-related imagery on school property, including on walls, desks, books, and equipment, sometimes accompanied by students’ names.
- Plaintiffs alleged other students performed “Hitler salutes,” made Holocaust jokes, and discussed celebrating Hitler’s birthday.
- Some plaintiffs alleged physical assaults and intimidation, including a severe beating with a hockey stick, repeated slapping, and an attempt to force pennies into a student’s mouth.
- Plaintiffs and their parents repeatedly reported the conduct to teachers and administrators over multiple years.
- Plaintiffs alleged the district and school officials often ignored, minimized, or dismissed reports, and that ineffective responses allowed harassment to continue.
- Plaintiffs alleged significant emotional distress and educational harm, including suicidal ideation by one student.

## Issues

1. Whether student-on-student anti-Semitic harassment of Jewish students is actionable under Title VI as discrimination based on race, color, or national origin.
2. Whether the evidence could permit a reasonable jury to find the district had actual knowledge of severe, pervasive, and objectively offensive harassment and responded with deliberate indifference under Title VI.
3. Whether the record could support § 1983 equal protection liability against the district and officials based on intentional discrimination or deliberate indifference amounting to intentional discrimination.

## Decision

- The court denied defendants’ motion for partial summary judgment in relevant part, allowing the Title VI deliberate-indifference claims to proceed.
- The court held that, on the summary-judgment record, anti-Semitic harassment tied to ancestry or ethnic characteristics could fall within Title VI’s prohibition of discrimination.
- The court found triable issues as to whether the harassment was severe, pervasive, and objectively offensive, whether officials had actual knowledge, and whether the responses were clearly unreasonable.
- The court also permitted § 1983 equal protection claims to proceed where the evidence could support a finding of intentional discrimination or deliberate indifference equivalent to intentional discrimination.

## Legal Principles

- Title VI may reach harassment directed at Jewish students when the challenged conduct is based on ancestry or ethnic characteristics, not solely religious practice.
- In peer-harassment cases under Title VI, liability may be shown where harassment is severe, pervasive, and objectively offensive; the recipient has actual knowledge; and the response is deliberately indifferent (clearly unreasonable in light of known circumstances).
- On summary judgment, courts must view evidence in the nonmovant’s favor; where the adequacy and reasonableness of a school district’s response is disputed, deliberate indifference is generally for the factfinder.
- Equal protection claims under § 1983 may proceed where evidence could support a finding that officials intentionally discriminated or were deliberately indifferent in a manner that constitutes intentional discrimination.

## Conclusion

The court held that the plaintiffs’ evidence of sustained anti-Semitic peer harassment and repeated reports to school officials created triable disputes on Title VI and § 1983 equal protection theories, so defendants were not entitled to partial summary judgment on those claims.


T.E. v. Pine Bush Cent. Sch. Dist., 58 F. Supp. 3d 332 (S.D.N.Y. 2014)