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2 days ago
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3 Kellam High students accused of racial harassment sue principal for defamation
VIRGINIA BEACH — On the morning of March 12, a group of Kellam High School friends got together at their usual gathering spot outside the school. It was one friend's birthday, and they celebrated by giving him presents before classes began. The gifts included a birthday card with handwritten notes, some candy and a bag of fried chicken. Videos later obtained from school surveillance cameras showed the group hugging and laughing after the gift exchange, according to a lawsuit recently filed in Virginia Beach Circuit Court. A teacher who witnessed the interaction told Kellam Principal Ryan Schubert about it a shortly afterwards, the lawsuit said. The concern: The three boys offering the fried chicken were white, while the one receiving it was Black, suggesting that the act may have been a play on an old and racist stereotype about Blacks and fried chicken. Soon, the students were brought in for questioning. They told school officials it was all just a joke. The teen celebrating his birthday also told them he thought the gift was funny, and said he'd even asked his friends to give him fried chicken for his birthday, the lawsuit said. Police and prosecutors were notified, but determined no crime had been committed, according to the claim. Within hours, representatives of the NAACP, school board and community members were contacting the school. The next day, Schubart authorized an email to all parents that described the incident as 'racist harassment' and said the students, who weren't named in the email, would be disciplined 'to the fullest extent possible,' the lawsuit said. Local TV reports soon followed. That was the last day the three teens attended Kellam, and now they have filed a $10 million dollar lawsuit against Schubart in Virginia Beach Circuit Court. They were suspended from school and they claim that — as a result of the school email and the television stories that followed — they have repeatedly been threatened with bodily harm, stalked, hostilely confronted by strangers, and have suffered damage to their property. A spokesperson for Virginia Beach Public Schools, which is not named as a defendant, didn't immediately respond Wednesday to a request for comment. Schubart couldn't be reached by The Pilot and no attorney was listed for him in online court records. The students who are suing are not named in the filing to protect them from further damage to their reputations, according to their attorney, Tim Anderson. Even though they weren't named in the email, other students and parents quickly figured out who they were, Anderson said. All three have been homeschooled since their suspension, and do not plan to return to Kellam next year even though they've been told they can, he said. 'The actions of Ryan Schubart were reckless, defamatory and an outright betrayal of the trust placed in a school principal,' the lawyer said in a message to The Pilot. 'Mr. Schubart knowingly spread false allegations against minor students — branding them as racists in a narrative he manufactured to appease political pressure. His email to the school community not only disregarded the truth but also destroyed the reputations and futures of innocent children.' Schubart knew the boy receiving the gift was friends with the others, and wasn't offended by the gift, yet left that out in investigative reports, the lawsuit said. He also failed to view the video or conduct a reasonable investigation before taking action, the complaint said. And a claim in the email that a teacher 'immediately intervened' when they saw the incident occurring was proven false by the video, Anderson said. The students' long-term suspension has put their academic futures in jeopardy, according to the claim, and their rights to due process were denied when they weren't given a fair and impartial disciplinary hearing. Jane Harper,
Yahoo
12-04-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
Critical veteran mental health care at risk due to Tricare payment issues, clinicians say
Health care providers serving veterans and their families across Virginia say they are missing thousands of dollars — with some having already gone out of business or are close to it — due to Tricare insurance reimbursements being stalled for months, leaving clients without critical mental health services. The stalled payments are apparently the result of a change to Tricare's billing processing system that began Jan. 1. Under the new system, licensed professional counselors must meet a series of new requirements or have a medical doctor sign off on their claims in order to be reimbursed, according to reports from clinicians and email chains between clinicians and Tricare provided to The Virginian-Pilot and Daily Press. Without being paid, the clinics either have to stop providing services to clients with Tricare coverage or are asking their clients to pay out of pocket. This change particularly affects Virginia because it has such strict standards for its licensed counselors and it has never before required oversight from a medical doctor, according to Melinda Staton, a licensed counselor and the acting president of the Hampton Roads Counseling Association. In trying to resolve these issues, clinics and their clients have been met with inconsistent messaging from Tricare, according to responses to a request for data on the issue by the Hampton Roads Counseling Association. In an email to The Pilot on Wednesday, a spokesperson for Tricare denied any change had taken place and did not address a follow-up question about whether payments had been stalled. 'Upon checking with our Tricare (subject-matter experts), we've learned that Tricare regulations and policy governing LPCs have not changed,' the spokesperson said. Staton sent out an urgent request for data on April 4 from its members on this issue with Tricare. Of 19 anonymous responses shared with The Pilot, representatives of different clinics reported a total of 977 patients being impacted by this change, for an average of 51 patients per responding clinic. One clinic reported as many as 261 patients being affected, while four reported less than four patients affected, including one clinic that reported that while reimbursements had been delayed for about three months, they'd had zero clients impacted because 'we keep seeing them and currently, we are getting payments.' These same respondents reported losses totaling at least $175,000 for an average of about $9,210 each. Some of the respondents did not know the exact financial impact, but one said they knew it was 'tens of thousands of dollars.' In response to the request for data, many reported failed attempts to get an explanation from Tricare with some reportedly being told Tricare was experiencing 'system errors' or facing a 'backlogs and policy changes.' 'In the short term, we need for those clinics that have not been paid to get paid yesterday,' Staton said. 'In the long term, we need policy change in the Tricare manual stating that residents can be used, especially if they're being supervised by a fully licensed professional counselor.' Staton said she's aware of at least two clinics that have closed in recent months due to unpaid reimbursements from Tricare. It's unclear how many clients have been impacted. Meichell Worthing, a licensed professional counselor and owner of Lighthouse Counseling and Psychotherapy in Virginia Beach, said about 25% of their clients are Tricare beneficiaries and have stopped taking on new clients covered by Tricare due to the uncertainty. Beth Hunter, a licensed counselor with Lighthouse, said one of her long-term clients who has struggled with suicidal ideation for years left her office in tears after she described the situation with Tricare. 'When I had to inform her that we have not been paid and that she has options of getting a doctor's referral … or she could pay out of pocket, which she can't afford to do, she just left my office in tears saying 'I don't know what I'll do,'' Hunter said. 'She didn't want to continue services for my sake because she knew I wasn't going to get paid but also for fear that what if Tricare never pays and then she's stuck with the bill for all these months of services?' The next day, Hunter said the client emailed her saying, 'I can't survive without therapy.' Staton said research shows military service members in the first year of transitioning to civilian life don't get some form of mental health care within the first year of leaving the military they are unlikely to seek it in the future, which leads to an increase in the suicide rate. 'There's no rocket science here, it's going to negatively affect (veterans). … If there's a barrier to access it can be fatal,' Staton said. Gavin Stone, 757-712-4806,
