High school student sues Texas governor and attorney general for failure to intervene in school district’s hair discrimination practices

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A high school student filed a civil rights lawsuit against Texas governor and attorney general, alleging they failed to enforce his rights under the CROWN Act, a state law that prohibits race-based hair discrimination. He also claims that his high school suppressed his ability to express himself, a liberty protected by the First Amendment.  

Key Players

Darryl George, a junior at Barbers Hill High School in Mont Belvieu, Texas, pins his locs into barrel rolls on his head, which he states are an “expression of cultural pride.” If George’s hair is not pinned on his head, it falls below his earlobes and eyebrows. 

Barber Hills School District currently serves over 7,000 students and employs over 1,200 teachers and staff in several schools located east of Houston. The district’s dress code prohibits male students from having hair that extends “below the eyebrows or below the earlobes” or “below the top of a T-shirt collar.” 

Gov. Greg Abbott (R) is the 48th governor of Texas and was elected in 2015. “Proud to sign the CROWN Act into law today to prohibit discrimination in housing, education, and employment based on hair texture and hairstyle. No Texan should face discrimination based on their natural hair,” Abott tweeted on Jun. 12, 2023, after signing the CROWN Act. 

Further Details

On Aug. 31, 2023, George received an in-school suspension for violating the school dress code. According to The New York Times, George said he was forced to sit in a cubicle throughout the day and have work delivered to him. He claimed that as a result of the suspension, he was denied access to the hot lunches he qualifies for under his school’s free lunch program. 

The next day, the CROWN Act, an acronym for “Creating an Open World for Natural Hair,” went into effect.  

George said that following his suspension, school officials repeatedly asked him if he had trimmed his hair. At a press conference on Sept. 7, his mother, Darresha George, argued that he had been growing his dreadlocks for 10 years and that all his male relatives wear the same hairstyle. She stated that the school warned Darryl he would be transferred to an alternative school if he did not comply. “I just really want my son to get the education he needs and not be discriminated against because of his hair,” she said.

On Sept. 8, the Texas Legislative Black Caucus issued a letter to both Greg Poole, the district superintendent, and Lance Murphy, principal of Barber Hill High School, asserting the suspension would establish a worrisome precedent. 

Candice Matthews, vice chair of the Texas Coalition of Black Democrats, noted that braids and locs must be kept long to maintain healthy hair. “It is a hairstyle that is cultural in nature,” she asserted. “The school is arbitrarily coming up with something else, saying that it’s really not the hair, it’s the length,” State Rep. Ron Reynolds (D) stated. 

Others stood behind the decision. David Bloom, a spokesperson for Barber Hills School District, maintained that the decision was not discriminatory. “The vast majority of hair code violation punishments – I.S.S. or more severe – have been handed down to white students,” Bloom stated, also clarifying that in-school suspension students are placed in a classroom under the supervision of one teacher, and that students are separated to be prevented from distracting one another. 

Subsequently, on Sept. 18, George was suspended for a second time because of his hair. 

Poole defended the suspension in an email to families of students attending Barber Hills. “I’m sure you may have seen our school district in the news recently. It is no surprise that the press present things with bias,” he wrote. “We recently had a mother bring her children from a neighboring district that has a different dress code than ours, knowing what our expectations are,” he then continued. Poole claimed that the same rules apply to all students, unless they provide a religious reason for exemption from the dress code. 

Simultaneously, the school requested that a court clarify the CROWN Act and its implications on its dress code, ABC 13 reported. 

Outcome 

George family files lawsuit, asks for temporary injunction

On Sept. 23, George and his family filed a federal lawsuit, alleging that Abbott and Attorney General Ken Paxton failed to step in on behalf of George. The family also claims that George’s suspension caused his mother to experience a sequence of seizures. 

The lawsuit also contends that the in-school suspension violated the federal Civil Rights Act, alleging the policy disproportionately targets Black students. The lawsuit requests an injunction to halt George’s suspension as the case proceeds through the court. 

Notably, this case is not the first of its nature in the school district. Barber Hills High School faced a similar lawsuit in May 2020, when then-students De’Andre Arnold and Kaden Bradford, who are both Black, sued the district after being told to cut their hair. The students’ families appealed for their sons to have an exception to the dress code, arguing that the students had worn their “natural hairstyles for years and that it was an expression of their heritage,” USA Today reported. 

But the school did not acquiesce, and the two students were subsequently expelled. “It’s like déjà vu all over again,” said Reynolds, who had worked to pass the CROWN Act, of George’s case. 

Darryl George goes to an alternative school 

On Oct. 11, George was moved to a disciplinary school for engaging in “chronic or repeated disciplinary infractions that violate the district’s previously communicated standards of student conduct,” the school said in a letter to George’s mother. As examples of disciplinary infractions, school principal Lance Murphy cited George’s tardiness, violation of dress and grooming policy, and nonobservance of administrative directives.