Four South Carolina students and a non-profit filed a lawsuit [complaint, PDF] in the US District Court for the District of South Carolina [official website] Thursday challenging the state’s “Disturbing Schools Law” [text, PDF]. The plaintiffs are challenging the law, which makes it illegal to “disturb in any way or in any place the students or teachers” or “act in an obnoxious manner,” arguing that the statute is unconstitutionally broad and its enforcement is arbitrary and discriminatory, primarily against African American students. Three of the four students were African Americans. One of the students, 18-year-old Niya Kennedy, was filmed being thrown to the ground, dragged and arrested for violating this statute, leading to the officer’s arrest and bringing the issue to a national stage. Violating the statute results in a misdemeanor charge with the potential for a $1,000 fine or 90 days in jail.

This lawsuit addresses the “school-to-prison pipeline” wherein students, primarily minorities, are taken out of schools and put into prison, making them more likely to end up in prison in the future. In August of last year, two children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and other special needs were handcuffed [ACLU backgrounder] with their arms behind their backs for behavior related to their disabilities. Both children were minorities—one Latino and one African American. Another African American student, 15-year-old Kyle Thompson, got into “a playful tug-of-war over a note” with his teacher, but handed the note over once he realized it was not playful. Michigan, where Thompson lives, has a ‘zero-tolerance’ policy and so Kyle was handcuffed, put on house arrest, and expelled [MSNBC report] from all state public schools for a year. Statistics also show that African Americans are harmed by this school-to-prison pipeline at a rate three times greater than white students, despite African American students making up only 16 percent of all those enrolled at public schools.