SURING, WI (WTAQ-WLUK) – The Suring schools superintendent has filed a motion to dismiss the false imprisonment charges filed against her in a vaping search incident.
Kelly Casper was charged with six counts of false imprisonment for the Jan. 18 strip searches at the high school. She has an initial appearance scheduled for March 23.
While searching for the vaping devices, Casper allegedly illegally confined the students. The district attorney previously had ruled the searches themselves were not illegal conduct.
In the seven-page motion, Casper’s attorney contends the criminal complaint does not support the law’s requirements for the charges.
“First, in order to sustain the charge, PUPIL 1 must be genuinely restrained or confined. This element required Superintendent Casper to deprive PUPIL 1 of the freedom of movement or compelled PUPIL 1 to remain where she did not wish to remain. The complaint indicates that while PUPIL 1 was in the nurse’s bathroom, Superintendent Casper stood outside of that room. Clearly, PUPIL 1 was not deprived of the freedom of movement. She was in a room with an open door and no one else was in the room with her. Further, there is no information contained in the complaint that PUPIL 1 did not willing and voluntarily go into the nurse’s bathroom. Nothing in the complaint indicated PUPIL 1 voiced a desire to leave the room,” the motion states.
“The jury instruction further requires that Superintendent Casper have the mental purpose to confine PUPIL 1. There is nothing in the criminal complaint which supports this proposition. It is clear the purpose of having each of the students in the bathroom is not confinement, rather privacy. The complaint provides no facts which support the conclusion that Superintendent Casper had any intent or desire to confine PUPIL 1.”
The motion also notes the students did not object, and the superintendent has the authority to remove students from the classroom.
“As previously mentioned, Superintendent Casper had the authority, as other school personnel do, to put a student into a room if there is a belief that the student is in violation of school code or possible violation of a criminal law statute. Nothing in the complaint supports the conclusion that Superintendent Casper lacked the authority to have any of the students enter into a room to conduct what the state has conceded was an act that did not violate the law,” the motion states.
Substantially similar arguments are made for all six counts.
Prosecutors have not replied to the motion yet, and no hearings have been scheduled.
The district has placed Casper on paid administrative leave.
