A Toronto high school reported one of its students to police in 2014 with a list of allegations — that the Grade 10 student had threatened, assaulted and battered other students with scissors, an umbrella, or a slingshot.

Days later, Toronto police arrested the student on a litany of charges, from death threats to assaults. The boy and his parents say the charges were stayed just a few months later.

Now, they’re tangled in a lawsuit against the school and the board over what happened. And while a national debate rages on across the border about school safety, the lawsuit provides a rare glimpse into how Toronto’s public education system responds to perceived warning signs of violence before involving police.

Documents filed in the case paint a picture of a student who struggled and wasn’t able to get the help he needed.

None of the allegations have been proven in court.

The boy and his parents, in their claim, say the boy had a history of being bullied; they say the school kept his parents in the dark at points, and that administrators took “no meaningful steps” to curtail the bullying he experienced over two academic years.

The school board and its administrators point to the boy as the problem — saying, in their defence statement, that his claims about being bullied are untrue, and listing allegations that he harassed, assaulted and threatened his peers.

The boy and his parents declined through their lawyer to comment on the case, and the school board declined to comment based on ongoing litigation.

In the fall of the boy’s Grade 9 year, his mother called the school, their statement of defence says. She told them her son had been bullied at a different school in Grade 8. The school and board deny that the previous bullying ever happened, according to their statement of defence.

In May 2013, late in his Grade 9 year, the school says the boy was accused of harassing three female students. The boy had been “throwing items at them,” their statement of defence says, and “spraying them with a water gun.”

He’d also shown them a drawing he’d made, they allege, in which the boy held “a gun or bazooka” and fired bullets at each of the three young women — who he identified by both “name and likeness.”

The boy and his parents wrote in their claim that the three girls had been bullying him. They denied in their response to the defence statement that the drawing was of their son shooting the girls — saying it was just two pages taped together, which he’d drawn in a previous year, depicting “a military tank and three stick figures, without descriptions.” They also say they were given “no clear reason” for why the school searched his locker in the first place.

It was only after school administrators confronted the boy about his “inappropriate conduct,” they wrote in their defence statement, that he said the girls had harassed him. The school found no “credible evidence” of that, they add in their statement. They say they launched their own investigation into the allegations against the boy, which involved searching his locker, and claim they found the drawing inside, along with a balaclava, black gloves, and a piece of rope.

School administrators met with his parents, along with the co-ordinator of the board’s safe schools department. After that meeting, the boy’s locker was moved where it’d be visible to an internal security camera.

Both sides agree that the request came from his family, but disagree as to why. “This was not done, as it is alleged, because (the boy) was being bullied,” the education officials wrote in their defence statement.

The boy and his parents’ claim says he continued to be bullied into the next year — at first by social exclusion and belittling, and later by a group of approximately six other male students who allegedly “called him names, made homophobic comments to him, threatened him, chased him, assaulted him and threw things at him.”

The school and board say the boy and his parents made no complaints about their son being bullied between May 2013 and Feb. 2014.

Then, in February 2014, everything boiled over. Administrators say in their defence statement that the boy had brought a slingshot to school, and had used it to “threaten and intimidate other students.” At this point, administrators say they learned of incidents wherein the boy had used scissors or an umbrella to threaten, assault, and batter other kids.

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They also learned that he’d “verbally threatened students and vocalized references to others (sic) incidents involving mass shootings at schools,” the statement of defence says.

The school then contacted the police. They sent the boy home on a suspension. Days later, he was arrested.

He was charged with seven counts of assault with a weapon, one count of assault, three counts of threatening death, one count of threatening bodily harm and one count of possession of a weapon for a dangerous purpose.

The board says their policies and the Education Act meant they had to report the incidents described that day to their School Watch Team — which is associated with Toronto police’s 14 Division. Peter De Quintal, a community school liaison officer with 12 Division who wasn’t involved in this case, explained to the Star that typically, it’s up to individuals schools to decide when they’ll contact police about a student.

“It’s up to their own decision making,” he said. “If there’s any criminality, in general they should be telling us immediately. But in some schools, they use restorative justice circles or other means before getting us involved.”

The Toronto public school board’s current protocols around police say that police have to be notified in cases of death, physical assault causing bodily harm requiring medical attention, sexual assault, robbery, criminal harassment, relationship-based violence, possessing a weapon or using one to cause or threaten bodily harm. Trafficking weapons, trafficking or possessing illegal drugs, hate or bias-motivated occurrences, gang-related occurrences and extortion are also on the mandatory police notification list.

When the school contacted police, the boy’s parents believe that his school provided false information that their son was on medication and suffered from mental illness. They allege that the school “acted maliciously and for ulterior motives,” including sanctions for a perceived disability or reprisal for his reports of being bullied.

The charges against their son were stayed two and a half months later, they allege, because the board had not provided surveillance video. The Ontario Ministry of the Attorney General was not able to confirm the status of the charges against the boy, as “information about outcomes in (Youth Criminal Justice Act) matters is not publicly accessible.”

After his arrest, the boy completed his Grade 10 year from home, and was later enrolled in a private school. After the experience, he was left with what his parents described in the lawsuit as “anguish,” “humiliation,” and a “loss of self esteem.”

His trust in the school, they write, was “irrevocably shattered.”

Furthermore, they allege, the school and board “failed to take adequate steps ... to ensure the safety and well-being of (the boy) were protected, that any threats were addressed promptly and that all reasonable steps were taken to prevent recurring risks to (the boy)’s well-being.”

The lawsuit is ongoing.