Jury awards no damages, despite judge's instructions
© 2007 Student Press Law Center
September 19, 2007
ARKANSAS — A school district that punished students who wore black armbands to protest the district's uniform policy violated the students' First Amendment rights, a federal judge ruled, but a jury awarded no damages to the students.
Judge Leon Holmes ruled that although the Watson Chapel School District’s dress code policy was legal, punishing students for protesting it was not. The judge then instructed the jury to decide the amount of damages, which the instructions said “must” be at least $1.
The jury, however, awarded nothing to students Chris Lowry, Colton Dougan and Micheal Joseph.
District officials did not dispute that the students were punished because their armbands were part of a protest against the dress code and also admitted the armbands did not disrupt the school, the court noted in its Sept. 13 judgment ...
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