A federal judge has dismissed a family’s sexual abuse lawsuit against the Prosper Independent School District.
The court found that the district could not be held liable for allowing a bus driver to molest the family’s two young daughters—identified in the lawsuit as Janie Doe 1 and 2—for most of a school year, in view of surveillance cameras.
The ruling came just weeks before a final pre-trial conference in the case.
On May 11, U.S. District Judge Amos Mazzant granted Prosper ISD’s motion for summary judgment, dismissing the case against the district.
A pedophile sexually abused the Doe Children on the very school bus that was supposed to get them to school safely. That is undisputed. It is also undisputed that Paniagua’s abuse violated the Doe Children’s constitutional right to bodily integrity. The central question is whether Paniagua’s conduct can be considered the conduct of the school district itself.
Under controlling precedent, it cannot. Summary judgment is therefore required.
Related claims against Prosper ISD Superintendent Holly Ferguson and then-Transportation Director Anna Marie Hamrick have also been dismissed.
The victims’ parents filed the civil suit in August 2022—three and a half months after bus driver Frank Paniagua was arrested following the girls’ outcry to family on May 7 of that year.
Paniagua’s abuse of the girls, ages 6 and 8 at the time, occurred regularly during the 2021-22 school year, either while the bus was on the Rucker Elementary School campus or driven off-route with just his victims on board.
He was charged with aggravated sexual assault of a child, continuous sexual abuse of a child under 14, and indecency with a child by sexual contact. Once booked into the Collin County Jail, Paniagua attempted suicide and died a month later on June 10, 2022.
Yet Paniagua’s crimes were only revealed to the public—and many Prosper ISD parents whose children rode the bus with “Mr. Frank”—by media coverage of the family’s lawsuit.
After years of legal wrangling, the case proceeded to discovery in 2025 and a pre-trial schedule was set.
In January 2026, Prosper ISD filed a motion for summary judgment, asking the judge to decide the case in its favor without a trial.
In his May 11 opinion and order, Judge Mazzant stated that plaintiffs “cannot satisfy the stringent standard of deliberate indifference in cases where no pattern of constitutional violations is alleged.”
The family claimed that district officials failed to properly train staff to identify sexual abuse and failed to properly supervise bus drivers via surveillance camera footage, “which, as both sides agree, plainly depicted Paniagua’s sexual abuse.”
The court concluded that Prosper ISD’s conduct “cannot be characterized as complete non-supervision” because school personnel would review surveillance footage if any incident or complaint was reported and the district fired Paniagua shortly after his crimes were discovered.
Judge Mazzant also dismissed the family’s Title IX claim, noting that the law does not create vicarious liability for the acts of a district employee. In addition, Fifth Circuit precedent holds that to establish liability, the law “requires that the district actually knew of the risk, not just that it should have known.”
According to Mazzant, the family needed to demonstrate that Prosper ISD had “actual knowledge” that their children were at a significant risk for sexual abuse by Paniagua and that the school’s response amounted to “deliberate indifference.”
The district’s failure to view available bus surveillance video that would have revealed the abuse—even during Paniagua’s April 2022 performance evaluation—did not rise to the level, according to the judge.
He wrote, “Title IX precedent creates a ‘high bar’ to hold school districts liable for the unlawful acts of school employees. The Court is bound to apply this precedent. Because there is no evidence that an appropriate person at Prosper ISD had actual knowledge of Paniagua’s abuse (or a substantial risk of that abuse) before the outcry on May 7, 2022, the Court must grant summary judgment as to Plaintiffs’ Title IX claims.”
Trustee Bill Beavers announced the dismissal at a Prosper ISD school board meeting Monday night.
What the dismissal does affirm is that our district response was the right one. District leadership acted immediately upon learning of the allegations, contacted law enforcement and child protective authorities, ensured the employee was arrested and terminated, and worked directly with the impacted family to respect the privacy and support their children. Multiple independent investigations have confirmed this.
“Throughout this process, the board of trustees has stood firm in its confidence in our district’s response, and this dismissal confirms that the district leaders responded decisively and appropriately,” added Beavers.
Beavers’ assessment didn’t sit right with some Prosper parents.
Several Rucker Elementary moms whose students rode Paniagua’s bus told Texas Scorecard that they were never notified by anyone in the district that their kids had been routinely exposed to a child molester.
Regarding independent investigations, one was commissioned by the board in September 2022. Trustees announced in January 2023 that the investigation was complete but declined to share any information with the public due to “pending litigation.” With the litigation dismissed, Texas Scorecard has requested documentation of the referenced investigations.
The board did show confidence early and often throughout the sex abuse scandal, while withholding information from the public.
Just months after the public learned from the media that Ferguson had hushed up news about Paniagua’s sexual abuse—including failing to notify the Texas Education Agency as required by law—Prosper ISD trustees voted unanimously to extend Ferguson’s superintendent contract. In addition, they gave her a raise, from $310,000 to $350,000, plus a $40,000 bonus.
Monday’s board meeting also included a farewell to Ferguson, who announced in March that she was retiring at the end of the year.
In addition, Prosper ISD swore in two new trustees, Kiwi Authers and Allen Rountree. They replaced Dena Dixon and Tommy Van Wolfe. Both incumbents withdrew after originally filing to run for re-election on May 2.
The new board of trustees selected Kelly Cavender as president and Garrett Linker as vice president for the coming year.
While one lawsuit against the district has been dismissed, Prosper ISD board members face a new legal action.
Local residents have filed a lawsuit to remove several trustees from the board, citing official misconduct related to the sex abuse case as well as obstruction of an investigation into construction contract fraud within the district.
Two of the named trustees, Dixon and Van Wolfe, are already gone. The removal petition also targets trustees Beavers, Jorden Dial, and David Webb.
The case has been assigned to Judge Larry Phillips of the 397th District Court in Grayson County. The prosecutor will be Kaufman County District Attorney Erleigh Wiley.
All Texas Scorecard coverage of the Prosper ISD sex abuse scandal can be found here.
