Two former Syracuse High School students allege Davis School District leaders suppressed their reports of sexual harassment and shut down an internal investigation, according to a federal lawsuit filed Thursday, Oct. 22.
The 85-page Title IX complaint, detailed by The Salt Lake Tribune, names the district, former Syracuse High principal Jed Johansen and several other administrators as defendants. The two plaintiffs, identified as Jane Does 1 and 2, say they reported harassment by a group of male students in fall 2023 and received no meaningful protection.
The lawsuit matters beyond Syracuse. Davis School District governs every public school in Bountiful, Woods Cross, North Salt Lake and Farmington, and the complaint alleges a "systemic, entrenched pattern" of failing to respond to student-on-student sexual harassment district-wide.
According to the complaint, a group of male students operated a Snapchat group called "Demon Time" and a public Instagram account called "Syracuse Barstool." The lawsuit alleges they used those platforms to share explicit images of female classmates and post content targeting girls by name.
Jane Doe 1 reported the conduct to school administrators in 2023, the lawsuit states. She was placed alone in a room with two law enforcement officers who downloaded explicit content depicting her and sent her back to class, ABC4 reported. She was then told to delete the images from her phone, leaving her without evidence, according to the Tribune. No one contacted her parents or explained her rights under Title IX, she said.
Jane Doe 2 reported AI-generated explicit images of herself to administrators around the same time. She was directed to fill out a form and given a "no-contact contract" that applied equally to her and one of the boys she accused, the lawsuit states. She was told not to discuss her report with other students.
The complaint alleges Johansen created his own reporting system that routed complaints directly to him, bypassing the district's Office of Equal Opportunity. The lawsuit also alleges an assistant superintendent whose sons attended the school and were associated with the accused students confronted an employee taking victims' complaints and told her to stop reporting.
When the district's human resources director sought to examine Johansen's district-issued devices for possible evidence, the superintendent blocked the effort, the lawsuit alleges. Johansen resigned in January 2025. The Utah Professional Practices Advisory Commission (UPPAC) later suspended his teaching license for four years after finding he "showed a pattern of harassment and inappropriate conduct," according to documents the Tribune obtained.
None of the male students accused in the lawsuit appeared to face suspension or expulsion, the complaint states. Jane Doe 1 stopped attending school, saw her GPA drop and finished her senior year online. Jane Doe 2 estimates she filed roughly 30 reports during her senior year, according to the Tribune.
Davis School District denied the allegations in a statement to ABC4, saying it "strongly and unequivocally rejects the allegations against district staff and employees and the characterization of their conduct." The district said it would respond through the legal process, adding that student privacy requirements limit what it can publicly disclose.
The plaintiffs are seeking compensatory damages for emotional and psychological harm. Their attorney, Alexander Chang of Sollex Legal, told the Tribune the district's failure to respond violated its own written policies for handling cyberbullying and sexual harassment.
The lawsuit is the latest federal complaint against Davis School District. In January, six families sued the district over a former Davis High School soccer coach's alleged grooming of teenage players, as KUER reported. The U.S. Department of Justice settled with the district in 2021 over widespread racial harassment of Black and Asian American students.
No public announcement of updated Title IX reporting procedures since Johansen's January 2025 departure appears in available district records.
