$1.1 million court settlement by Success Academy charters for violating children's rights

Gary Rubinstein broke the story on his blog today that Success Academy had agreed to pay $1.1 million and reasonable attorneys’ fees to five families, whose children had their rights repeatedly violated and were pushed out of the Success Academy Fort Greene charter school, the home of the infamous “Got to go” list.  Success agreed to settle the case, Lawton vs. Success, after nearly five years of delays before the case even came to trial, rather than deliver the evidence to the plaintiffs that the court ordered.  Here are more details and court filings.

Here is the August 2018 decision by the US District Court Judge, Fredrick Block, who refused Success’ request to dismiss the case, and instead described the horrific treatment that these five children with disabilities were subjected to starting at the age of four and five, including repeatedly being removed from class early, dismissed, suspended and denied their mandated services. 

Here is the February 2020 acceptance by the families of Success’ Offer of Judgement of $1.1 million plus reasonable attorney fees; which the charter chain chose to provide before going to trial, rather than release the full documentation ordered by the Court, which would further detail the abusive treatment of these children.

To this day, Success has refused to pay what the attorneys consider to be reasonable fees, so here is the most recent court filing by the families’ attorneys from Advocates for Justice, NY Lawyers for Public Interest, and Stroock Stroock and Lavan, detailing all the hours and work they put into the case over nearly five years, along with payments to experts who validated the fact that these children’s civil rights were repeatedly violated.  

These three documents are embedded below.