Hingham and Carver among 14 districts sued over legality of school mask mandates

Hingham, Carver, West Bridgewater and the Bridgewater-Raynham Regional School District are caught up with 10 other school districts, two communities and the state education department in a series of six lawsuits challenging local and state school mask mandates.

All six lawsuits have been consolidated into one action pending in Hampden Superior Court at the request of the state Department of Elementary and Secondary Education. Five of the lawsuits, including all of those against local school districts, have been filed by one New Hampshire lawyer, Robert Fojo.

Fojo has also filed a flurry of lawsuits in his home state against mask mandates in schools and at the state level and against remote learning access.

The 14 Massachusetts school districts are named in five lawsuits, and they contain mostly the same background information. The lawsuits are against the school districts, which have individual mask mandates, and the state Department of Elementary and Secondary Education,  which has said masks are required in all Massachusetts public schools for now. 

"If (the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education) rescinded its policy today, every school district would still have a mandate in place," Fojo said.

The department  approved a statewide mask mandate in August that would have allowed masks to come off in districts with an 80 percent vaccination rate on Oct. 1. That date was later pushed to Nov. 1.

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Fojo said the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education  and individual school districts don't have the authority to issue mask mandates to students, and that if anyone did have that power, it would be the state Department of Public Health.

"Even so, (the Department of Public Health) has never come down with this kind of a broad health measure," Fojo said.

A nonprofit organization, Children's Health Rights of Massachusetts, is the plaintiff in three of the lawsuits, including the one against Hingham, Carver, West Bridgewater and the Bridgewater-Raynham school district.

"Many of these parents want to pursue and support this legal effort, but they wanted to remain anonymous, so they decided to pursue these claims through a nonprofit organization," Fojo said.

Going through the nonprofit  allows parents to pool their resources, he said, instead of going it alone. 

Children's Health Rights of Massachusetts was recognized as an organization by the  Secretary of State's Office on July 28, according to its incorporation documents.

The group is also the plaintiff in a separate lawsuit against school districts in Attleboro, Andover, Easton and Sandwich, and another targeting school districts in Franklin, Tyngsboro and the Northboro-Southboro regional district, as well as the school district and city of Cambridge. 

One of the lawsuits, against the the Dover-Sherborn regional school district and the town of Dover, was filed on behalf of a purported nonprofit called Citizens for Medical Freedom. However, the group does not appear to exist, according to record searches on the secretary of state's corporations database. Its listed address is a house in Sherborn.

Someone named Joan Kingsley signed a declaration attesting to the group's legitimacy but, like the group, she does not appear in the corporations database. Attempts to reach Kingsley were unsuccessful.

Fojo said the group is real and he did not know why it wouldn't appear in the corporation searches.

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Fojo said he is against the cases being consolidated because it will lead to a major delay in proceedings, creating a "mammoth" court action. Hampden Superior Court Judge David Hodge heard arguments on consolidation Tuesday, but has not issued an opinion.

A Florida nonprofit called the Family Freedom Endeavor, along with five Massachusetts parents, is also suing the state Department of Elementary and Secondary Education over the mask mandate and opposed its lawsuit being consolidated with Fojo's.

The group's attorney, Ryan McLane, did not respond to requests for comment.

Department of Elementary and Secondary Education spokeswoman Jacqueline Reis said she won't comment on pending litigation.

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Material from State House News Service was used in this report. Reach reporter Wheeler Cowperthwaite at wcowperthwaite@patriotledger.com.