By Jior CameronThe Seattle Medium The Seattle/King County Branch of the NAACP announced that it will be moving forward with a lawsuit against the Kent School District. The Seattle/King County Branch of the NAACP had previously filed a $10 million claim against the district last March. The lawsuit is being filed on the behalf of 14 students, from fourth graders to high school seniors, against the Kent School District, Superintendent Barbara Grohe, and one security guard. Attorneys said the names of other guards employed by the district would be added later once they are discovered. The law offices of Egan, Hamir, and Garrett, Jr. will represent the students and their families in the suit. This lawsuit is in part, the culmination of various events reported to the NAACP concerning the mistreatment of children of color in the Kent School District. The district and its security guards are accused of utilizing excessive force in their dealings with the students named in the suit. These issues became public when the Seattle/King County Chapter of the NAACP began receiving numerous phone calls from concerned parents about the alleged abuse of their children at Kent schools. The lawsuit alleges that Black students, who make up 10 percent of the district’s 26,000 students, were subjected to more corporal punishment than others, violating state constitutional guarantees of equal protection. One such incident involving Shetoia Ellis, a student at Kent-Meridian high school, was previously reported in The Medium. Ellis alleges that during her sixth period class, a substitute teacher told her to leave the classroom for talking out of turn. Ellis stayed in the class and kept doing her work until a Black female security guard and a White security guard arrived and told her to leave the class and she did. Ellis stated that once they got outside of the classroom the male security guard pushed her face into the lockers and dug his fingers into the nerves behind her ears, and said that it was at this point that she resisted and was pulled to the ground by her hair. Investigations into the alleged events, both by the NAACP and The Kent School District’s committee, found many reasons for alarm. Among the troubling findings, The NAACP uncovered a detention room in an elementary school that mimics cells in actual prisons, complete with the sliding metal door of protective bars. In addition, the Kent School District’s chosen committee alone found 55 points of concern. “The Kent School District has turned educational institutions into penal institutions,” said Seattle/King County Branch, NAACP President Carl Mack, referring to the excessive measures used such as hair pulling, arm twisting, pressure points, handcuffs, and other methods some would call vicious to restrain and detain students. The NAACP and its representation maintain that these extreme, “shocking,” and “outrageous” measures are not conducive to a positive educational environment where the main goal is learning. “Three students (involved in the incidents) have left the Kent School District, and have been earning much better grades elsewhere,” noted Seattle/King County Branch NAACP Educational Chair, Sakara Remmu. According to the NAACP, previous attempts to rectify the problems with the Kent School District have seemingly fallen on deaf ears, as the district has failed to do anything to solve them. “The district has routinely dismissed such complaints for 10 years, and has refused to change its policies despite meetings with the NAACP,” said Mack. Mack said the NAACP will no longer tolerate these actions, and is now turning to the courts to reform the problems. “This lawsuit seeks changes to occur in the system, and in the leadership of the district,” remarked Mack. He continued, “We want the Kent School District to move from a police state to an educational state.” Many in the community feel that the lawsuit has been filed at both and important and critical time, as the NAACP has recently gained knowledge of yet another incident, occurring just two weeks ago.