Muslim student sues Louisiana school over Bible distribution

By The Associated Press

04.11.01

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Joe Cook

Editor's note: In a legal response filed May 10, the school board admitted Cotton passed out the Bibles, but said no students were coerced into accepting them. The board also asked to have a jury trial. No date has been set. The school board admitted that fifth-grader Hesen Jabr's teacher let the students play a game, but said it was a "secular holiday game," not the religious game alleged in the lawsuit.

ALEXANDRIA, La. — A Muslim student in a public elementary school alleges she was forced to accept a Bible and participate in a "Jesus game" in school and was told by classmates that she would "burn in hell," according to a lawsuit filed yesterday.

The lawsuit, lodged against the Rapides Parish School Board, charges that the school district and Principal John Cotton violated the constitutional rights of 11-year-old Hesen Jabr in two alleged incidents that occurred at the Paradise Elementary School in Pineville last December.

"The teaching of religion belongs in the home, the church, the synagogue, the temple and the mosque, but not in the public schools," said Joe Cook, executive director of the Louisiana chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, which filed the lawsuit in federal court. "This little girl has been the target of severe persecution and harassment by her classmates because of her religious beliefs."

The lawsuit said Cotton presented the child's fifth-grade class with Bibles on Dec. 14, 2000, in his office while wishing each of them "Merry Christmas."

"Hesen Jabr declined to accept the Bible, saying 'No, thank you' to Cotton when he presented it to her," the lawsuit said. "Cotton told Hesen to 'just take it,' and because she felt pressured by the principal of her school, Hesen accepted the Bible from him."

After she then told two classmates that her family did not believe in the Bible, she was told that she would "go to hell," that she was a "Jesus-hater," and that her family "would burn in hell," the lawsuit said.

When her mother and grandmother complained to Cotton, the lawsuit says, they were told that Cotton "has been distributing Bibles in school for 35 years, that no one had ever complained before, and that he saw no reason to stop."

Five days later, during a Christmas party in the classroom, the teacher arranged a quiz game that had to do with Christmas and Jesus and suggested that Hesen serve as scorekeeper because she "might not know the answers to the questions." The suit says the girl agreed to do so out of deference for her teacher.

In a statement, the girl's mother, Fatima Jabr, said: "The issue here is not whether one religion or faith is better than another, but about forcing one's faith on another person with no respect for that other person's right to practice their own beliefs.

"Mr. Cotton violated our daughter's right to an all-inclusive, non-religious environment in a public school," she added.

No one answered the phone at Paradise Elementary after the ACLU had filed suit yesterday afternoon, and a call to the parish superintendent was not returned.

Starting with the outlawing of religious training in public schools in 1947, the Supreme Court has dealt with the issue for more than 50 years, outlawing school prayer in 1962 and ruling last June in Santa Fe Independent School District v. Doe that students could not lead prayers at public school athletic events.

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