Number of parents, students in vaccination suit against state, school districts drops

The number of parents suing the state and Long Island districts over their children’s removal from school dropped from nearly three dozen a few weeks ago to 14 in an amended complaint filed last week in federal court.

The number of students included in the suit also sharply decreased, from 56 to 14.

The lawsuit stemmed from a state investigation into former Amityville nurse practitioner Julie DeVuono and her practice, Wild Child Pediatrics. The state has accused DeVuono of falsifying childhood vaccination records. 

The state Department of Health in September voided measles, mumps, diphtheria and other vaccination records of 133 Long Island children, and one from Orange County, because it said they were DeVuono's patients and the state determined she had falsified their records.

Parents began receiving notices from the state and their local districts last month that their children did not meet the immunization requirements and must provide valid proof of vaccination. Children in New York must receive polio, chickenpox, hepatitis B, measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccines, as well as other immunizations, to attend school unless they have a valid medical exemption.

DeVuono and her company last year pleaded guilty in connection to a COVID-19 vaccination card scheme, and she was sentenced earlier this year.

The attorneys representing the parents said in the latest court filing that "the conduct underlying the nurse practitioner’s conviction is wholly unrelated to administering childhood vaccinations."

DeVuono has not been criminally charged over the pediatric vaccinations, but the state health department has filed administrative charges against her.

Chad LaVeglia, a Hauppauge-based attorney representing the parents, said some of the parents included in the original complaint filed Sept. 27 "decided to revaccinate their children while others found suitable alternatives."

LaVeglia did not detail the nature of those alternatives. LaVeglia’s co-counsel, James Mermigis, did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

Arthur Caplan, a professor of bioethics at New York University and an expert on vaccine policy, said some parents might have obtained vaccinations as their children faced removal or were removed.

"I think basically finding out that there was a fraudulent scheme to avoid vaccination and then getting the parents to understand that it’s not acceptable to put their kids and others at risk and seeing that they likely have revaccinated [their children] is a very good effort by the health department," Caplan said. 

The lawsuit was filed in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York. The amended complaint named the state health department and 11 school districts as defendants.

"Unfortunately, these children and so many others have had their lives disrupted because the government places its policy objectives above the Constitution," LaVeglia wrote in an email.

The parents behind the suit alleged the defendants denied their children due process and violated state laws when they excluded compulsory-age children from school.

The 14 students included in the lawsuit range from elementary-age children to high school teenagers, according to affidavits parents filed along with the complaint.

Some of them were honor students and excelled academically, parents wrote. Some were kicked off sports teams and could not participate in band or chorus practices. The students feared disconnection from their teachers, friends and peers in school, and some had nightmares, parents said.

"I'm afraid that my child will never be the same again," one parent wrote in the suit. 

The named school districts either did not respond to a request for comment or declined to comment. State Health Department spokeswoman Erin Clary said the department does not comment on pending litigation and does not collect "real-time data" on exclusions.

The department has said its yearslong investigation into DeVuono is ongoing.

A similar suit filed in state court was dismissed Oct. 1, with a judge noting parents had choices: Obtain required vaccinations, undergo blood tests that could detect antibodies, or home-school their children.

In a court filing submitted Sept. 24 in that case, Joseph Giovannetti, director of the state Health Department’s Division of Legal Affairs’ Bureau of Investigations, said his team has found evidence that DeVuono provided thousands of fraudulent pediatric vaccinations against "life-threatening, vaccine-preventable diseases" such as measles and polio.

The plaintiffs, he wrote, were asking the judge to ignore the public health risk inherent in having dozens of students "concentrated in Long Island schools whose only proof of immunization against potentially deadly diseases comes from a criminally convicted vaccination fraudster who has been stripped of her license and has fled the state altogether." 

DeVuono now lives in Pennsylvania.

By Dandan Zou

dandan.zou@newsday.com@DandanZou

Dandan Zou covers education for Newsday. Previously, she worked for a community newspaper in Maryland and a personal finance magazine in Washington, D.C.