INDIANAPOLIS (WRTV) — An Indianapolis woman has filed a lawsuit against the Metropolitan School District of Wayne Township, claiming the district took no action when she reported being sexually assaulted multiple times by another custodian.
The lawsuit filed Wednesday in Marion County court accuses Wayne Township and Ben Davis High School of negligent hiring, supervision, and retention practices.
According to the lawsuit, the incidents started in April 2024, when the male custodian started seeking her out, starting conversations and trying to hug her, eventually escalating into physical contact.
She says the male custodian’s actions made her uncomfortable, but when she reported it to the head custodian, she was told to “leave it alone” as she had no evidence to support her claim.
In May 2024, the woman reported the male custodian had inappropriately touched her to her direct supervisor, hoping the custodian would be removed from her area of the school.
The lawsuit says her supervisor said, “she would speak with the head custodian, as she could not enforce anything without speaking to her first.”
No changes reportedly came from either complaint.
In June 2024, the lawsuit says, the woman had been reassigned to work in the same area and same shift as the male custodian.
The first sexual assault occurred during one of these shifts, the lawsuit claims.
The woman’s attorneys say she contacted police after the first attack, and the dispatcher — who spoke fluent Spanish and could clearly communicate with her — then contacted a school security officer.
While she was waiting for the security officer, the man and another cleaner, also a male, followed her into a classroom. She says the men mocked her and told the school security officer and police dispatcher that the incident was “merely a prank.”
The head custodian arrived sometime after, telling the school officer that “everything was fine” and “she would take care of it.”
“Despite (the woman’s) obvious distress and disheveled appearance, (the head custodian) did not ask police to conduct an investigation,” the lawsuit says. “No ambulance was called. (The head custodian) did not take (the woman) to the emergency room for an examination, nor did she arrange anyone else to take her.”
After the woman asked to go home, the complaint says, “(the head custodian) refused and instructed her to finish the remaining six hours of her shift, warning her she would be terminated if she left the school before then.”
At least six more sexual assaults happened in the following months, including one in which the woman says she believed she had been drugged by the custodian before the attack.
The woman did not report this attack, the lawsuit noting she “determined there would be no purpose served in reporting the rape to the school.”
The school did not fire the male custodian until the fall of 2025, when the woman showed video of the custodian groping her while at work to the assistant principal.
The woman is no longer employed by the school district.
The lawsuit concluded with a demand for a jury trial, asking the court to enter judgment against the defendants “in an amount to be proven at trial, including compensatory damages, general and special damages, and punitive damages.”
