Suit Seeks to Upset Ruling on Ailing Girl

A South Bay school district filed suit Friday seeking to overturn a ruling ordering the district to enroll a 6-year-old girl paralyzed from the neck down in a regular kindergarten class.

The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court by the Palos Verdes Peninsula Unified School District, seeks reversal of a Sept. 11 decision by a state hearing officer who ordered the district to put Stephanie Stratford in a regular class at Rancho Vista School.

Stephanie’s parents had fought the district decision to have her taught in special education classes for the orthopedically handicapped. A malignant tumor on the girl’s spine has put her in a motorized wheelchair and robbed her of the use of her limbs.