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A pregnant city special-ed teacher was violently kicked in the stomach by one of her students — then fired by officials who blamed her for the terrifying outburst, a shocking lawsuit claims.
Then-kindergarten teacher Lauren Vitale, 31, was six months pregnant when she was attacked in January by one of her pupils, who has a documented history of violence, according to her Manhattan Supreme Court suit.
The special-needs kindergartner had been placed in the classroom at Staten Island’s PS 84 without giving Vitale any advance warning of her violent past — part of a troubling pattern by the adminstration of targeting the teacher, the suit says.
The child ended up spitting in Vitale’s face and kicking her in her pregnant belly — which resulted in the mom-to-be suffering from bleeding, low fetal movement and high blood pressure, according to court papers.
But instead of supporting Vitale over the assault, the school’s principal immediately blamed her for it, the lawsuit alleges.
Vitale was eventually fired when she protested, court documents claim.
“They said that I could have avoided the kick to my stomach. I’m not Keanu Reeves — I can’t dodge a bullet,” Vitale told The Post.
“It’s been one of the hardest experiences of my life,” she said. “I was in fear that I was going to lose my baby.”
Vitale, whose daughter is now 2 months old, said the alleged horrific experience was the climax of a years-long pattern of discrimination, hostile work environment and retaliation by education bosses against her.
City officials declined to comment.
Vitale claims in ther suit that her trouble began as far back as her 2023 hiring process, when the principal asked if she planned on getting pregnant “anytime soon” and laughed.
“I was uncomfortable, but I needed a job,” Vitale told The Post of the encounter.
She said in her suit that she then felt especially targeted in early 2024 after she filed a union complaint over the placement of a different dangerous student in her classroom.
The child bit her and struck her with a curtain rod, Vitale’s lawsuit says.
In response to Vitale’s complaint, the principal called her to his office, labeled her a “whistleblower” and warned that she had “opened Pandora’s box,” court documents allege.
Then this past September, when Vitale was eight weeks pregnant, she privately shared her good news about the baby with the school’s guidance counselor — also a union rep — who she considered a friend, her suit says..
But the news was immediately leaked to the principal, who cornered her in her classroom and “badgered” her into confirming it minutes later, Vitale says in her suit.
She was immediately slapped with a punitive Teacher Improvement Plan, the lawsuit claims.
“Once I was pregnant, I was scrutinized more, [the principal] would come and observe more, and I just felt there was a change,” Vitale told The Post.
Then came the student who kicked her in the stomach in January, the teacher said.
“Everything seemed perfectly fine until she then spit in my face,” Vitale recalled.
Later in the day, the student then kicked the pregnant teacher in the stomach, the suit says.
Vitale took herself to a labor-and-delivery unit, where she “experienced bleeding, cramping, decreased fetal movement, and high blood pressure,” according to the filing.
She later learned that the student had violently assaulted teachers at her other school, her suit says.
“I felt like I was being set up,” Vitale said.
When she returned to work a few days later, the principal “flipped the script,” she said.
He criticized her injury report, falsely accused her of corporal punishment, docked her pay and denied her work injury claim, the suit says.
A week after filing a grievance with her union in April, she was allegedly fired — just before she would have become tenure eligible.
Now, unemployed and with a newborn at home, Vitale says she “wants her job back.”
“I want to work with children, I want to be a teacher. I just want to be back where I belong,” she said.
“I’m heartbroken by everything that’s happened.”
English (US)