West Virginia high court won't intervene in pro-anarchy teen's case

By The Associated Press

11.28.01

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CHARLESTON, W.Va. — West Virginia's Supreme Court has refused to consider an appeal from a high school student suspended last month for wearing an anti-war T-shirt and for trying to form an anarchy club.

Katie Sierra, who opposes war and terrorism and promotes peace, was suspended for three days last month for defying school orders not to form an anarchy club or wear T-shirts that include slogans opposing the U.S. bombing of Afghanistan.

A Kanawha County Circuit judge then upheld the suspension. The school claimed the girl's actions disrupted student learning.

The high court voted 3-2 yesterday not to consider Sierra's petition to prevent the lower court from "continuing to deny her freedom of speech."

Justices Robin Davis and Larry Starcher voted to consider the case. Justices Warren McGraw, Joseph Albright and Elliott Maynard rejected the petition.

Meanwhile, Sierra has been pulled from school by her mother out of fear for her safety.

Sierra, 15, has enrolled in a Kanawha County school program in which she will complete assignments on a computer from home, said her mother, Amy.

Amy Sierra said her daughter has been physically attacked, threatened and insulted by other students at Sissonville High School.

"It was my choice. It wasn't her choice," Amy Sierra said Nov. 26. "She misses her friends. It's a shame she can't be around her friends and be a normal kid and go to school."

One day, Katie Sierra showed her mother a bruise on her side, saying a boy had slammed into her in a hallway while she stood by her locker. The girl was unable to identify her attackers, her mother said.

"She was getting assaulted over and over again, and I got fed up," Amy Sierra said. "I'm just so worried somebody's going to hurt her bad."

The handwritten message on the T-shirt that got her in trouble with the school district read: "When I saw the dead and dying Afghani children on TV, I felt a newly recovered sense of national security. God Bless America."

The family's attorney, Roger Forman, said the decision to keep the girl out of Sissonville High wouldn't jeopardize the case. "If we get a ruling protecting her rights, then they're going to have to protect her better," Forman said.

Katie Sierra is expected to start the home-based Oasis program this week. She is waiting for school officials to deliver a computer to her Sissonville home. Most students enrolled in the program cannot attend school because of illness or injuries. Katie Sierra received special permission from Kanawha County Schools Superintendent Ron Duerring.

The girl's fight with the school district has attracted attention from news media worldwide. Students at two colleges and a high school in San Diego circulated petitions in her support. At Harvard University's School of Public Health, students made anti-war T-shirts to honor her.

Closer to home, support has been far from unanimous.

Students spat on her mother's car at the high school. Her friends' parents wouldn't give her rides home from school. A boy wore a T-shirt signed by many Sissonville students who oppose her.

The shirt read, "Go back where you came from."

Sierra was born in Panama. Her parents met at Eastern Kentucky University in Richmond, Ky. Her father was a native of Panama. Her mother grew up in Ashland, Ky.

Sierra has attended 15 schools. She has lived in Texas, New Mexico, Ohio, Florida and Kentucky.

Update

John Tinker pledges support for pro-anarchy teen
Participant in landmark Supreme Court case upholding students' free-speech rights urges Katie Sierra not to back down.  12.04.01

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Teen barred from forming anarchy club, wearing anti-war T-shirt
West Virginia circuit judge says free speech is 'sacred' but such rights are 'tempered by the limitations that they ... not disrupt the educational process.'  11.02.01