This story contains details of alleged sexual assault some readers may finding disturbing. If you, or someone you know has experienced sexual assault and need to talk about it call 1-800-656-4673. If you need to talk about mental health concerns, call or text the national crisis hotline at 988.

LANSING, Mich. (WLNS) – The Mason Public Schools are facing a federal lawsuit alleging it has mishandled an alleged sexual assault because the parents of the accused perpetrator are high-ranking Ingham County officials.

In a lawsuit filed Feb. 2 in the Federal District Court of Western Michigan, an attorney accuses the district and the perpetrator’s parents of colluding to readmit the teenager at Mason Public Schools. The boy had been expelled from the district after a Title IX investigation found he had subjected her to actions that were “so severe, pervasive and objectively offensive,” it interfered with her right to education.

Title IX is a federal law that requires equal access to education and prohibits sexual harassment, including sexual assault.

That was in 2022.

But in 2023, the parents petitioned the school to allow the boy to return to classes in Mason. The school board voted in October to allow him to become a student again.

Her mom tells 6 News tonight, the incident has impacted her daughter’s education and performance in school. That’s because her daughter is constantly reminded of the assault when she sees the boy in the school hallways.

“Her quality of life is definitely hindered big time, the mom says. “Her desire to want to go to places and want to go to places out in the community – go to movies, or roller skating– she doesn’t want to do that.”

Attorney Brandon Wolfe filed the lawsuit seeking to have the boy permanently removed from the Mason School district.

“Plaintiff E.M. was sitting in her English class at a table when B.D., who was attending the same class, pulled her chair closer to him and leaned forward as if he was going to tell her a secret but instead, forcefully put his hand inside E.M.’s sweatpants and underwear and digitally penetrated her vagina without consent,” the lawsuit alleges.

After the assault was reported a Title IX investigation was launched. That investigation ran parallel to a criminal investigation conducted by the Mason Police Department. While the Title IX investigation was ongoing, the criminal case was referred to the Ingham County Prosecutor’s Office, then under the direction of former Prosecutor Carol Siemon.

Siemon recused the office from the case, and it was referred by the Office of the Attorney General to Jackson County Prosecutors to review. A juvenile petition, the legal term for a criminal charge for a juvenile, was not filed because the girl didn’t want to testify, Wolfe tells 6 News.

The boy was allowed to attend Mason High School at the start of 2023 school year. He was the subject of both a no-contact order by the school and a personal protection order from an Ingham County Judge. The lawsuit says he violated both multiple times since returning to the school.

As for the key allegation in the lawsuit, Wolfe accuses the parents of the boy and Mason officials of conspiring to return the boy to the Bulldogs’ hallways. Wolfe alleges in the suit that the parents – one of whom is a countywide elected official in Ingham County and the other a high-ranking official in the county, were “acting under their unique positions of power when they conspired with the Mason Public School District and Board of Education to allow the boy to return to school.”

Asked what evidence he has to back up the claim, Wolfe concedes none – at this time.

“Yeah, I mean, well, that’s what the discovery process is for,” he says. “That’s why it’s in a lawsuit right now. I anticipate—we anticipate that maybe that some phone records or emails will be revealing and it’s the only explanation for this egregious favoritism for this one child.”

The girl’s mother believes allowing the boy back into the school was an act of favoritism.

“We’re asking for him to not come to school,” she says. “And we are being told, ‘sorry, he’s still going to.’ So, I don’t know what the difference is then.”

6 News has sought comment from the Jackson County Prosecutor’s Office as well as from Mason Public School Board of Education members. 6 News is not identifying the parents of either the boy or the girl because both are minors and no juvenile charges have been issued. Neither of the attorneys representing the boys’ parents commented.

This story contains details of alleged sexual assault some readers may finding disturbing. If you, or someone you know has experienced sexual assault and need to talk about it call 1-800-656-4673. If you need to talk about mental health concerns, call or text the national crisis hotline at 988.

For the latest news, weather, sports, and streaming video, head to WLNS 6 News.