Federal judge dismisses claims against five Steamboat school employees in disabled students' abuse lawsuit; district still faces most of the case

Developing. This story will be updated with responses.

A federal judge on Thursday narrowed the lawsuit that four Routt County families filed over the alleged abuse of their children with disabilities at Steamboat Springs High School, dismissing the claims against five current and former school administrators and teachers and leaving the school district itself to face most of the case.

U.S. District Judge Charlotte N. Sweeney ruled in a 25-page order that qualified immunity, which shields government employees from personal liability unless they violated a "clearly established" right, protects former Superintendent Celine Wicks, former interim high school principal Ron Peterson, former special education director Anne-Marie Tennyson and special education teachers Chuck Rosemond and Dan Juba from the constitutional claims brought against them personally.

The families' briefs, she wrote, did not explain how the cases they cited clearly established the rights at issue, though her ruling "isn't to say that Plaintiffs lacked (or possessed) a meritorious case."

The Steamboat Springs School District RE-2 asked the judge to dismiss only two of the nine claims against it and has answered the other seven, including disability discrimination claims under Section 504 and the Americans with Disabilities Act. One race-discrimination claim also continues against former paraprofessional Sylvia Rawlings, who the complaint says called a Black student a "monkey"; the judge found those allegations, accepted as true at this stage, describe a clearly established equal protection violation.

The order does not expressly address the two disability-law claims that name the four district employees, or the Title VI claim that names Wicks and Peterson, in their official roles; courts treat such claims as claims against the district itself. The Independent is asking the parties whether the four remain in the case.

The ruling came 10 days after a special meeting of the RE-2 board whose agenda listed a possible closed-door session on "a settlement demand" in the case, at a meeting the agenda said was "open to the public but will not be livestreamed for future viewing." Whether the session took place is not yet public; no minutes have been posted. Colorado's open meetings law bars adopting any "position" or "formal action" in a closed session.

The lawsuit, filed in January 2025 and amended this February, says the four students, all nonverbal, were denied bathroom help, left in soiled clothing, restrained and, in one case, spun in a wheelchair until it overturned. The district denies most of the allegations. It admits that Rawlings "pushed [the student's] wheelchair while playing a game and that the wheelchair accidentally tipped over" in January 2023, and that it would not have investigated without a parent's demand the next day; it says Rawlings told her supervising teacher and the principal "immediately reported the incident" to the school resource officer. The district denies the "monkey" allegation and says the principal investigated reports of the comments. Rawlings resigned days later and, the complaint says, pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor count of crimes against an at-risk person.

When the suit drew attention in September 2025, then-Superintendent Wicks said in a statement to the Steamboat Pilot & Today that the district did "not agree with many of the allegations and characterizations" and had made "significant leadership and system-wide changes."

The Independent asked the district, the families' attorneys and lawyers for the individual defendants for comment at 7:47 a.m. Friday and will update this story with their responses.

What's next: discovery was put on hold in October 2025 while earlier immunity motions were pending; the docket shows no scheduling order or trial date. The board's next meeting had not been posted as of Friday morning.