Ky. Christian School Sued for Outing Teen Over Rainbow Cake and Shirt

The parents of a Kentucky teen who was expelled for celebrating her birthday with a rainbow shirt and cake have now filed a lawsuit against the school, alleging defamation and invasion of privacy. The lawsuit claims that the school outed her to the public when it said that the teen's birthday attire and cake "demonstrates a posture of morality and cultural acceptance contrary to that of Whitefield Academy's beliefs."

The parents of Kayla Kenney, 15, who was expelled after her mother, Kimberley Alford, posted a picture of the birthday celebration on Instagram, have now sued the private Christian school Whitefield Academy in Louisville for "breach of contract, emotional distress, and defamation,"

"They [the school] made an assumption about a child's sexual identity based on a birthday cake and a sweatshirt," said Georgia Connally, the attorney who filed the suit.

The lawsuit names Kenney as LGBTQ but says that she was not out prior to being expelled, according to TV station WDRB.

Upon being made aware of the birthday picture, Whitefield's head of school, Bruce Jacobson, sent the photo to Kenney's parents with a note announcing her January 6 expulsion.

"The WA Administration has been made aware of a recent picture, posted on social media, which demonstrates a posture of morality and cultural acceptance contrary to that of Whitefield Academy's beliefs," Jacobson wrote. "We made it clear that any further promotion, celebration or any other action and attitudes counter to Whitefield's philosophy will not be tolerated."

Jacobson alleged that the incident was another in a line of "lifestyle violations" Kayla Kenney had made over the past two years. Previous violations include Kenney being caught with an e-cigarette and for cutting school during lunch.

The lawsuit alleges that Whitefield failed to follow its own disciplinary rules when it expelled Kenney.

"This lawsuit is about whether or not [the school] followed their own rules when they expelled Kayla, and they didn't," Connally said. "They skipped a whole bunch of [disciplinary] steps and went straight to plan Z, in my book, which is expelling a 15-year-old based on a photo."

Meanwhile, Whitefield officials say the media has twisted the narrative and that Kenney had been given several chances to adhere to the code of conduct.

"Inaccurate media reports are circling stating that the student in question was expelled from our school solely for a social media post," the school said. "In fact, she has unfortunately violated our student code of conduct numerous times over the past two years. In the fall, we met with the student to give her a final chance to begin to adhere to our code of conduct. Unfortunately, she did not live up to the agreement, and therefore, has been expelled."

But Connally has rebutted the school's assertion that it was not in the wrong.

"The school went to the media to defend themselves. They have a privacy policy, a confidentiality policy, that's also in the contract, and they didn't follow it. And that put a child in harm's way," Connally said.

"There's no religious exception for defamation, invasion of privacy, intentional infliction of emotional distress," she added. "There's no exception for those rules. If those things were done, then they're just as liable as a public entity would be."