I found the document linked below that allows the school to search state owned property like a kid's locker and locker contents. This should have been done and as far as I know it was not, but it's not clear to me that the kid's backpack could have been searched. I found another article that says:

**from the article at https://massp.com/legal-searches-in-school-reasonable-suspicion-required **

School policies may alter or remove students’ privacy expectations in district-owned items by notifying them that no privacy exists as to desks, lockers, and district-issued technology. But generally, students have a reasonable expectation of privacy in their personal items, like clothing, bags, vehicles, and cell phones. When school officials want to search a student, the search must be supported by “reasonable suspicion.”

Reasonable suspicion exists if there are reasonable grounds for suspecting that the student has violated the law or school rules. The search as actually conducted must then be reasonably related in scope to the circumstances which justified it in the first place.
** end article**

Given what we know was there reasonable suspicion that the kid was in violation of the law or of school rules?

The publication linked below talks about coming up with a monitoring plan for apparently troubled kids but not about sending them home which seems to be only under pretty strict circumstances, like physical assaults, etc.

The school seems to have been in a very difficult spot. Search the kid's bag and there's nothing their they face a lawsuit. I don't know that they have the power to send him home.



[Post edited by 81_Hokie at 12/04/2021 12:03PM]