Lawsuit Filed in South Orange-Maplewood School Hijab Incident – The Village Green

The family of a second-grade student who alleges her teacher forcibly removed her hijab in class has filed a lawsuit against the teacher and the South Orange-Maplewood School District.

According to attorney Robert Tarver, the girl’s parents, Joseph and Cassandra Wyatt, have filed a suit on the student’s behalf “seeking damages for emotional distress, humiliation, loss of enjoyment of life and other pain and suffering.”

Tarver told the News-Record that the teacher, Tamar Herman, a 30-year veteran of SOMSD, “is no longer teaching at Seth Boyden.”

Village Green has reached out to both Tarver and the school district for confirmation.

Tarver reported that the student returned to the classroom last October shortly after the alleged incident.

The incident continues to be under investigation by the Essex County Prosecutor’s Office, according to Maplewood Police Chief Jim DeVaul. The MPD and ECPO took over the investigation from the school district last October. “Certain aspects of the case are being reviewed by the ECPO,” said DeVaul in an email today. “I can confirm the case is still under their review as recently as last week.”

Meanwhile, at a press conference in Newark on Jan. 6, Tarver explained that the Wyatt family’s lawsuit “alleges violations of New Jersey’s law against discrimination because it is unlawful under statute for an individual, whether it be a teacher or anyone else, to discriminate on the basis of religion of religious expression, which is exactly what Ms. Herman did when she deliberately, intentionally and forcefully moved the child’s hijab from her head.”

Tarver said that the school district is included in the suit because, he alleges, the district knew that Herman had been reported for similar incidents by other parents in the past. Tarver outlined other incidents at a press conference in Maplewood last October.

Herman has issued statements denying any intention to knowingly remove a religious article. Herman’s first statement, made her behalf by attorney Samantha Harris, reported that she had asked the student to remove a hooded sweatshirt and then rescinded the request when she realized that the hoodie was being used as an hijab. In a second public statement, Herman said that she “gently brushed back” the girl’s head covering before realizing it was being used as a hijab.

At the end of the second statement, Herman wrote, “I pray we can move forward as one community. Let us find a place where all of us can be our best selves and make a better kinder world. I miss you so much!”

Tarver and the family dispute that the girl was using a hooded sweatshirt as an hijab, as well as Herman’s characterization of the incident. “We have also been able to confirm, and we know this beyond a doubt through video and eyewitness accounts, that my client, this child, was not wearing a hoodie as has been suggested by Ms. Herman but that she was in fact wearing a hijab which she has worn every day in class since … school started,” said Tarver at a press conference in October.

Both the Wyatt family and Herman report receiving threats and seeking police protection. Herman’s representatives said she was forced to seek protection after CHS grad and Olympic Bronze Medalist Ibtihaj Muhammad published her identity and address on social media.

In October, Superintendent of Schools Dr. Ronald Taylor reported that the district had received “threatening” comments in a message to the community calling for “patience and civility.” Taylor reported that the district’s Central Office and the Seth Boyden elementary school’s main office had been “flooded with hundreds of calls and … over 2,000 emails, a majority of which have been from parties outside of our community and New Jersey” and that “some of the correspondences have been threatening, disrespectful, and vulgar in nature.”

Also in October, Cassandra Wyatt drew criticism on local social media groups for online posts pointing to Herman’s Jewish religion as a potential reason for her actions. In one post, Wyatt wrote, “I JUST FOUND OUT THE TEACHER IS JEWISHHHHHHHHH,” followed by 17 crying emojis, and then later wrote in reply to another commenter, “that’s why I believe she did it now I’m furious.”

Asked to comment on the posts last October, Tarver responded, “[Ms. Wyatt] wants everyone to know that she is not racist, that she is not xenophobic and that she doesn’t have any religious bias toward anyone because she has been subject to that herself as a Muslim woman.”

Tarver added, “She regrets it. She regrets that it has caused people some pain. But you can imagine a mother in that situation who is learning that her child has been violated. She told me, ‘Imagine the outrage that would be if someone ripped a yarmulke off a Jewish child’s head. That’s the same thing I’m feeling now.’”