- Two students who survived the Oxford High School shooting are suing the school district for $100 million.
- Lawyers for the students claimed school officials have deleted digital evidence.
- U.S. District Judge Terrence Berg ordered the defendants to "preserve all electronically stored evidence."
A lawyer for survivors of the Oxford High School shooting claimed school officials have destroyed evidence following the shooting on November 30 that left four dead and several others injured.
In a court filing, attorney Nora Hanna, who represents two Oxford High School students who survived the shooting, accused school officials of deleting digital evidence after "several social media pages of the Defendants and webpages were deleted on behalf of Oxford Community School District."
Lawyers representing Oxford senior Riley Franz, 17, and freshman Bella Franz, 14 in a $100 million lawsuit against Oxford Community Schools claimed actions by school district officials put the sisters at "risk of serious and immediate harm" by allowing the shooting suspect, 15-year-old Ethan Crumbley, to return to class without searching his backpack the day of the shooting or alerting the police. The lawsuit names the Oxford school district superintendent, the high school's principal, and a slew of other administrators and staff members as defendants.
Hanna, alongside attorney Geoffrey Fieger, cited the deleted LinkedIn page of someone who said they worked for the school district, saying it is "evident that Defendant destroyed his social media page." The attorneys also cited error messages on the Oxford High School website and the deletion of school administrator listings as further proof of deleting evidence.
"Not only did defendants fail to take necessary steps to preserve the evidence, but they willfully destructed the evidence by deleting the webpages and social media accounts," Hanna wrote in the filing. "Plaintiffs cannot continue to be blindsided by the defendants by having to search for what evidence is being destroyed or altered."
Hanna and Fieger did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.
Attorney Timothy J. Mullins, who is representing the school district, told The Detroit News that the lawsuits were "bombastic stunts masked as legal filings" that "do a disservice to the people of Oxford and the people of Michigan."
Mullins called the filings "sloppy," claiming the attorneys named someone in the lawsuit who hasn't worked with the district in a year, The News reported. Mullins did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.
In addition to requesting the school district and local police to preserve records, the Franzs' attorneys asked a slew of cell phone and social media companies and local businesses to do so as well.
On Friday, U.S. District Judge Terrence Berg ordered the defendants in the case to "preserve all electronically stored evidence that relates to the subject litigation."