Family sues Norwin over alleged disability rights violation, claims defamation by school director

A North Huntingdon family filed a federal lawsuit this week against Norwin School District, claiming their civil rights were violated.

Melissa Karabin; her husband, Matthew Karabin; and children, Samantha and Joseph Karabin, filed the 12-count lawsuit Thursday in U.S. District Court in Pittsburgh, seeking a jury trial and unspecified damages.

The 67-page lawsuit accuses the school district of violating the family’s civil rights under the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, the Rehabilitation Act that requires access to programs and activities of a federally funded organization, the Americans with Disabilities Act and the First Amendment right to protection against retaliation.

Norwin School Board member Alexander Detschelt of North Huntingdon also is named in the lawsuit, as a board director and as an individual. He is accused of defaming Melissa Karabin in a series of social media posts between 2021 and 2023. Detschelt also is accused of being a party to denying her access to school activities.

Attorney Russell Lucas, Norwin’s solicitor, said Friday the school district and Detschelt are still reviewing the allegations and will have no further comment on the litigation while it is pending.

“We assert that the claims advanced in the complaint are without merit, and we will be defending the suit zealously,” Lucas said.

Attorney Kristen Weidus, who represents the Karabins, and Melissa Karabin could not be reached for comment Friday.

Melissa Karabin, who is permanently disabled because of chronic fatigue syndrome that started in March 2020, claimed in the suit she was a victim of discrimination when the district did not provide sufficient accommodations for her attendance at school board meetings and other events. The suit states that Karabin was “largely bed-bound” in 2021.

By instituting a mask-optional policy for the 2020-21 school year, both of her children opted for instruction through Norwin Online Academy because of their predisposition to covid and possibly exposing their mother to covid, the lawsuit states.

Samantha Karabin, who graduated from Norwin in 2023, started developing symptoms similar to her mother’s in December 2020, and her condition only worsened in the spring of 2021. Norwin is accused of not providing ADA accommodations for Samantha in her online education.

By April 2022, her brother, Joseph, who remains a Norwin student, developed chronic fatigue syndrome, according to the suit. Norwin allegedly discriminated against him when his health condition prevented him from accessing some of the educational programming.

Detschelt is accused of one count of defamation. The lawsuit cites 15 examples of Detschelt’s social media posts that targeted Melissa Karabin. Among the social media statements were ones that said “she believes laziness is an ADA recognized disability” and that the only disability “she’s shown to have is that of being an attention seeker.” Detschelt also wrote in 2023 that Karabin needed “a 201 voluntary commitment” for mental health treatment for Munchausen Syndrome, where a person fakes or exaggerates a physical or mental disorder.

In writing the social media posts, Detschelt made them outside of any conditional privilege as a public figure and “outside of any potential shields of liability,” the suit states.

Detschelt and the school district are both accused of violating Melissa Karabin’s First Amendment rights by denying her access to a school board meeting. The suit claimed she was a victim of retaliation by Detschelt because of her liberal political views that clash with his conservative politics.

The Karabins also claimed in one count of the lawsuit that Norwin is liable for failing to create a policy to identify the needs of students with physical disabilities and mental health disorders, and for failing to train employees to implement it.

Both parents claimed their Fourteenth Amendment rights were violated by the district because the school district disregarded their children’s emotional and physical needs, as well as their fragility.