ST. LOUIS COUNTY, Mo. – A St. Louis County school district is calling out the Missouri Attorney General for inaccuracies in his letter calling for an investigation into the district after a fight involving high schoolers went viral earlier this month. An attorney for the school district is accusing the state’s top law enforcement official of using the fight between a Black student and a white student for political gain.
Officers with the St. Louis County Police Department received word of a fight in progress just after 2:30 p.m. on Friday, March 8, near the intersection of Norgate and Claudine drives, just north of Hazelwood East High School.
Police arrived to find Kaylee Gain, 16, suffering from a severe head injury. She was taken to a hospital, where doctors discovered Gain suffered a fractured skull and brain bleed as a result of the fight.
Video of the fight shows more than a dozen teenagers involved in the fracas. Kaylee can be seen moving toward another girl in the street. That girl takes Kaylee to the ground and, while on top of her, bashes Kaylee’s head into the pavement.
On Saturday, March 9, police arrested a 15-year-old girl in connection with the fight. She’s being held on assault charges.
A pair of GoFundMe pages organized by a family friend and Kaylee’s cousin have raised more than $440,000 to go toward Kaylee’s medical bills.
As of March 23, Kaylee is breathing on her own.
Attorney Bryan M. Kaemmerer, who represents the Gain family, said in a statement two weeks ago that the family wants justice to come through the legal system and does not want retaliation of any kind toward anyone either directly or indirectly involved in the fight. In the meantime, the family’s focus remains on Kaylee’s well-being and recovery.
Gregory N. Smith, the lawyer representing the 15-year-old in her assault case, released a follow-up statement to deflect an unfair mischaracterization of his client.
“She was on the honor roll, played in the orchestra and also played on the school’s volleyball team,” Smith said.
The statements from both attorneys denounced bullying and teen violence.
On March 22, Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey sent a letter to Dr. Nettie Collins-Hart, superintendent of the Hazelwood School District, and local media to notify them that his office had begun an investigation into the district’s mandated training of Hazelwood East school resource officers.
Days before Bailey issued his letter to the district and public, FOX Files reporter Mitch McCoy attempted to question the attorney general about the fight. However, Bailey’s aides stepped in, saying he did not have time to speak before he was driven away.
In the letter, Bailey called for an investigation into the district’s mandated diversity, equity, and inclusion training.
“By putting DEI agendas ahead of protecting students and neglecting to have law enforcement presence on campus, Hazelwood School District has failed in its fundamental duty to ensure a safe learning environment,” Bailey wrote on social media.
The attorney general spent the last few days making appearances on national news media outlets to voice his outrage over DEI policies and overall school safety.
On Tuesday, March 26, the Hazelwood School District responded to the attorney general’s notice of investigation.
Attorney Cindy Reeds Ormsby of the law firm Curtis, Heinz, Garrett & O’Keefe was called upon to represent the school district. Ormsby sent a letter to Bailey and local media to not only respond to the attorney general’s allegations and correct some basic facts about the incident, but also say the district would not submit any records to his office.
Addressing Bailey, Ormsby writes that his investigation is “based on lies that you could have easily ascertained if you would have taken a few minutes to fact check prior,” and accuses the AG of “spouting falsehoods that only serve to rile your base.”
Bailey’s letter incorrectly states the date and time of day at the fight, Ormsby said. She added that the presence of school resource officers on campus would not have prevented a fight from taking place off school property and outside the school day.
The school district’s lawyer said the attorney general “failed to provide a single ‘race-based policy’ that has led to the absence of SROs and how such policy was prioritized over school safety.”
Ormsby also called into question the peculiarity of Bailey voicing outrage over the fight near Hazelwood East when there’s been no record of the attorney general speaking out about the stabbing death of a student in the Jennings School District while the student was on his way home. That incident happened a week after Kaylee Gain was injured. FOX 2 examined Bailey’s two accounts on X, formerly known as Twitter, and could find no mention of the Jennings stabbing.
Ormsby pointed to a lack of mention from the AG’s office when the Riverview Gardens School District and the Ferguson-Florissant School District went to virtual instruction for days following fights between students on campus during school hours while SROs were on duty. She said Bailey did not send either district a letter. According to Ormsby, Bailey did not send a public letter to the Normandy Schools Collaborative after a student attacked a teacher.
In her letter, the Hazelwood School District’s attorney asked Bailey if he represents all residents of Missouri or just its white citizens. Ormsby said Bailey’s accusations about the Hazelwood School District are based on a false narrative and therefore the district is under no obligation to provide him with anything. She concluded her letter by saying the district would provide him with records through a Sunshine Law request.
Read the Missouri Attorney General’s notice of investigation below, dated March 22:
Read the Hazelwood School District’s response below, dated March 26:
Hazelwood School District’s response by KevinSeanHeld on Scribd
