Mother Sues Bethel, Board of Ed, After Daughter’s Suicide

BETHEL — The mother of a 12-year-old Bethel Middle School student who took her life last year is suing the town and the school district.

Manuela Maria Macedo Silveira was a "victim of depression," according to a GoFundMe campaign established last July to pay for her funeral expenses.

The petition, filed in May as part of pre-lawsuit discovery, states that the child's mother, Marcia Robinson, filed a Notice of Intent to Sue the town and the Board of Education in December. The petition claims that Manuela had come under the care and treatment of school "counselors, psychiatrists, social workers, human resource officers, psychologists and/or therapists," and that "negligence" on the part of the schools and the town may have led to her death.

Robinson is seeking psychiatric, counseling and other medical and mental health records from the schools, which she claims are being denied her. The petition is requesting the court order the deposition of the keepers of records of R.M.T. Johnson Elementary and Bethel Middle Schools.

Attorneys for the Boards of Education and the town filed a motion earlier this month to dismiss the petition, arguing that it does not "satisfy the requisite standard to warrant circumventing the normal course of discovery."