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Oct 12, 2009 11:24 pm US/Pacific
Slur On School Locker Leads To Legal Action
SUTTER CREEK, Calif. (CBS13) ―
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Justin Zysman says the anti-Semitic language was etched in his locker for more than a year.
CBS
A local teen has filed legal papers against his school district after it allegedly took more than a year for anti-Semitic slurs to be erased from his locker.
Justin Zysman is the great-grandson of Holocaust survivors, so when he found the words "burn, Jew, burn" carved into his Amador High School locker it hit him particularly hard.
"It was before gym class, and I walked in… everyone was chuckling and I thought I missed something," Justin said.
Justin, who plays football with the Amador High Thundering Herd, wasn't sure if he was dealing with pranksters or something more serious, and he said school staff didn't seem to take it seriously.
"I went to my coach and he asked me if I was offended," Justin said.
The vandalism wasn't the end of ethnic taunting: Justin said his gym clothes were urinated on and classmates were making Nazi salutes. Despite repeated requests to school officials, nobody fixed the "burn, Jew, burn" etching on his locker for his entire freshman year.
"Their response was to let it stay up for 13 months," said Molly Zysman, Justin's mother. "What they should have done was not let it stay up for even an hour."
Justin's parents decided to file legal papers to protest the delay in removing the offensive language. A spokesperson for the Amador County School District would only say, "Because of the ongoing investigation we really can't comment."
The Zysmans' attorney says the California Department of Education is looking into this case, and also noted that a civil lawsuit against the school district is in the works.
(© MMIX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
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