A 35-year-old woman suing the Los Angeles Unified School District, alleging she was sexually molested by an employee when she was a teenager at San Pedro High School nearly two decades ago, is seeking a default judgment against the former instructor.
The plaintiff is identified only as Jane Doe in her Los Angeles Superior Court lawsuit, in which she alleges negligence, sexual abuse of a minor, intentional infliction of emotional distress and sexual assault and battery. She seeks unspecified compensatory damages against the LAUSD and punitive damages against the alleged perpetrator, John Jerome Rule.
Doe’s attorneys have filed court papers with James I. Montgomery seeking a default judgment against Rule, who allegedly has not participated in the case. In contrast, the LAUSD has responded to the suit. In their court papers, the district’s lawyers deny Doe’s allegations and cite multiple defenses, including that Rule, if he did abuse Doe, was not acting within the course and scope of any alleged employment relationship with the district. LAUSD lawyers also maintain that Doe’s claimed damages are “speculative and uncertain.”
According to her suit, Doe was 14 years old and a freshman in the 2004-2005 school year and graduated in 2008. She was a member of the school dance team, the Pirate Dancers. At the end of Doe’s sophomore year, she and her fellow Pirate Dancers were preparing for the end of the year dance production called Dance Concert 2006, the suit states.
The stage crew teacher asked Rule to assist with the stage design and construction as well as lighting for the show, according to the suit, which further states that Rule graduated from San Pedro High School and took classes in stage design as a student.
Rule, then in his late-20s, was often at San Pedro High School both during and after school assisting with the preparation of Dance Concert 2006, the suit states. During rehearsals and practices for the event he began befriending Doe while intending to manipulate her at her young age so he could ultimately sexually abuse her, the suit alleges.
“Rule openly flirted with plaintiff on the San Pedro High School campus in front of teachers, administrators and staff members” and also had personal conversations with her that increased over time, the suit alleges.
Rule then began spending time with Doe off-campus at social gatherings where he provided alcohol to the plaintiff and other minors and later told Doe he wanted a relationship with her before kissing her for the first time, the suit states.
Rule subsequently became intimate with Doe and told her not to tell anyone, according to the lawsuit, which further states that Doe was 16 at the time and that some of the abuses occurred at Rule’s home near the school and that he took videos of their interactions.
Rule also worked on Dance Concert 2007 and Dance Concert 2008, in each case having access to Doe and other female minors at the school, the suit states.
The school administration failed in its responsibility to adequately and properly investigate, hire, train and supervise their staff and to protect their students from harm allegedly caused by “unfit and dangerous individuals” such as Rule, the suit filed Jan. 6 states.