Lawsuit: 56 students faced removal over Wild Child vaccinations

Fifty-six Long Island students in 22 districts were removed from school or faced removal for invalidated vaccination records at the end of last month, according to a federal lawsuit, showing more students than previously disclosed have been affected by what the state deemed fraudulent immunizations from a former Amityville nurse.

At least nine of students couldn't attend class as of Sept. 27, when the lawsuit against the state Health Department and school districts was filed in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York. Others were days away from being barred from attending school, according to the complaint.

One of the students, a Sayville high school senior, faced imminent removal, according to the complaint. The student, described in court documents as a "football star," was being recruited and might lose the opportunity to play college football at some schools if he is removed from the team, the complaint said.

A similar lawsuit filed in state court was dismissed Oct. 1.

The cases stem from a state investigation into former Amityville nurse Julie DeVuono and her practice, Wild Child Pediatrics, who the state has accused of falsifying childhood vaccination records which students are required to have under state law to attend school. DeVuono and her company last year pleaded guilty in connection to a COVID-19 vaccination card scheme.

Sean Clouston, an epidemiologist and professor of public health at Stony Brook University, said he thinks it is fair to exclude students if they cannot prove they were vaccinated.

"Vaccines have this amazing property that a vaccinated person not only is more able to protect themselves but also can help to protect more vulnerable people around them," he wrote in an email. "Many people, including other students, may have compromised immune systems. ... They cannot make use of vaccines themselves and are only protected by vaccination in others."

The state Health Department last month voided measles, mumps, diphtheria and other vaccination records of 133 Long Island children, and one from Orange County, because it said DeVuono falsified them. It had earlier sent subpoenas to more than 100 school districts asking for vaccination records of about 750 children. It's unclear how many students on Long Island have been barred from school.

Newsday last week reported that the Plainedge district excluded four students due to Wild Child vaccines.

The state Education Department this week referred questions to the state Health Department. State Health Department spokeswoman Erin Clary said the state "does not maintain real-time data on school exclusions."

The current status of most of the students mentioned in the suit is also unclear.

The 22 districts named as defendants either declined to comment on pending litigation or did not respond to a request for comment. They also declined to comment on individual student’s vaccination or enrollment status. Christine Criscione, superintendent of Mount Sinai schools, one of the defendants, said no district students have been excluded due to Wild Child vaccines.

An attorney for the parents declined to say whether the students mentioned were indeed removed from school and whether they have returned to school. Hauppauge-based attorney Chad LaVeglia said he can't comment on the specifics but he and his co-counsel James Mermigis will file an amended complaint.

In a statement, he wrote: "When the government takes away a fundamental right like education it must provide due process. The Constitution requires it. That’s what this lawsuit is about."

Mermigis had also filed a similar lawsuit in state court on behalf of many of the same parents. Both sought a court order to prevent the health department and school districts from removing students from school.

Nassau County Supreme Court Justice Christopher T. McGrath, who dismissed the state case, noted parents had choices: obtain required vaccinations or undergo blood tests which could detect antibodies. They could also home-school their children.

In the state case that named many of the same districts as defendants, schools contended they acted under the direction of the state Health Department and therefore took no position other than to follow state directives, the judge noted.

Mermigis did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

The state Attorney General's Office, which is defending the state Health Department, declined to comment Friday.

In a court filing, Rudolph M. Baptiste, assistant attorney general, emphasized to federal District Court Judge Nusrat J. Choudhury that the second litigation was "in a long line of recent and similar unsuccessful challenges" where the plaintiffs sought to restrain the department from fulfilling its statutory duty to protect public health and safety.

Mermigis and LaVeglia in separate filings in federal court said the state court decision was neither "binding nor persuasive."

"The Nassau County Judge ignored all of our constitutional arguments," Mermigis wrote. "Children have been removed from school and/or threatened to be removed from school without process or an opportunity to be heard."

Lisa Chin, a lecturer of public health at SUNY Old Westbury, said: "We don’t dismiss the importance of individual rights, but there is something greater at stake here."

She has seen students removed from her college because they did not have paperwork showing they were vaccinated.

"One of the things I tell my students is the fact that we actually no longer have that historical memory of children and people dying from polio," she said. "We have forgotten."

With Lisa L. Colangelo

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.