Jury finds Kalispell school district retaliated against Title IX reporting

After about two and a half hours of deliberation, the six-person jury decided that Kirk had participated in activity protected under Title IX and that the school district had retaliated against him and his son because of it. 

The jury awarded the Nances nominal damages of $1 each, which is what they had requested. 

"This isn't about money," Kirk said on the stand. "This is about the safety of students." 

Their counsel also plans to seek attorney's fees, according to Michael Bliven, a member of the plaintiff's legal team.

"We're just happy the truth came out," Avery Field, attorney for the Nances, told the Missoulian after the trial. "It's been a long time coming."

In 2023, Clifford was a homeschooled student who competed on the Glacier High wrestling team along with a student referred to in court documents as KB. According to testimony from several other members of the wrestling team, Kirk would regularly attend Clifford's practices and competitions. On Jan. 7, 2023, at a tournament in Ronan, KB disclosed to Kirk that he'd been sexually assaulted and hazed on a bus the previous year, according to court documents. 

Kirk went to KB's mother, and the two of them reported the incident to the Kalispell Police Department on Jan. 9, 2023. On the same day, the two parents and a third wrestling parent, Steve Biggs, sent an email to Glacier High principal Brad Holloway asking for a meeting to discuss potential hazing on the wrestling team, according to court documents. An officer with police department also called the district to let them know there had been a report of sexual harassment. The next day, several district officials met to plan how to investigate and address the allegations.

In the months that followed, the district conducted a full Title IX investigation into the wrestling team, and the Kalispell police also investigated the claims, according to court documents. Two students who police and the district found had participated in the hazing were removed from the wrestling team and a third student was disciplined, according to NBC Montana.

In the week following the report by Kirk and the other parents, the school district took several actions against Kirk, according to court documents. On Jan. 10 and 11, Kirk was removed from wrestling practice, where he was observing quietly, and told not to come back. On Jan. 12, Kirk met with Holloway. On Jan. 13, the police were called to the Stone Creek Lodge in Missoula where the team was staying, and Kirk was cited for disorderly conduct after head wrestling coach Ross Dankers and volunteer coach Garrett Melton told police he was being disruptive and threatening. On Jan. 14, district athletic director Mark Dennehey texted Nance to tell him he was no longer allowed on school property without permission.

After the Missoula hotel incident, Clifford testified, the three coaches stopped giving him any coaching and Dennehey blocked a request he made to transfer to another team later that year. 

The coaches and the defense team argued that the actions against Kirk were all warranted to protect the integrity of the investigation in the potential sexual assault and hazing, and that the coaches had information that Kirk had been interrogating students.

"There's an unwritten rule that parents aren't to be interfering with our students while they're competing," Dennehey testified this week. 

According to the Nances' lawsuit, school district officials were aware from the beginning that Kirk had been involved in making the police report, and district employees and volunteers retaliated against him because of it. 

According to the school district, Kirk was erratic, disruptive and threatening toward district staff in the week following the report, and that was why he'd faced adverse action.

Field said in closing statements that not a single student testified that they'd been interrogated by Kirk.

"Where were all of the interrogated students?" Field asked. "How many students did they call that said that?" 

KB said in his original interview with police that Kirk Nance had initially accused him of perpetrating hazing, but said on the stand this week that Kirk Nance hadn't done so. 

Field also pointed out that Melton's son was one of the students accused by KB of perpetrating the assault, arguing that if coaches were really concerned about making sure no one was influencing students in regard to the allegations, they shouldn't have kept the father of one of the accused students as a volunteer coach. 

According to testimony from the district's Title IX coordinator Sara Cole, Melton had seemed to coach his son's answers in an investigatory interview, and KB had reported some hostile demeanor from Melton in the aftermath of his own report.

Cole sent an email to the coaching staff at the end of the 2023 wrestling season saying that Melton's conduct "could have been received as retaliatory," so he shouldn't return as a volunteer coach.

In testimony, Cole said she was referring to Melton's behavior toward KB, not the Nances.

In closing arguments, school district attorney Elizabeth O'Halloran said that no other parent involved in reporting the harassment faced adverse action from the district, suggesting it was due to Kirk's behavior. She said that Kirk hadn't been particularly involved in the investigation and hadn't provided actionable information to the district.

She pointed to the fact that Kirk had been cited for disorderly conduct at the Missoula hotel.

"People have been excluded from district property for much less," O'Halloran said.

Field was not yet sure how this verdict will affect the Bliven Law Firm's other cases representing former wrestlers with the Glacier High wrestling team.

Attorneys for the school district said they were disappointed in the outcome. 

"As the attorneys for the district, of course we are disappointed in the verdict, but respect the process that the jury went through," said Kevin Twidwell, a member of the district's legal team.