Mother sues Colorado school district after she says her special needs son broke legs at school

An Adams County mother is suing Adams 12 Five Star Schools after she says her 12-year-old son with special needs broke his legs while left unattended.

"I don't know if Esdras will be able to walk, will be able to get back to where he was," said Patricia Portillo Estrada.

Portillo Estrada and her son sat down with CBS Colorado Monday morning, hours after her attorney filed a lawsuit against the district.

"He's a very happy kid (and) optimistic. He always had a good attitude," said Patricia Portillo Estrada. "It's until this accident happened that he changed a lot."

Esdras Cruz was born and continues to live with several neurological and physical impairments, including lumbar myelomeningocele, hydrocephaly, bilateral clubfeet, scoliosis and spina bifida. However, Esdras was also a fighter and determined to overcome all his odds.

"The doctors have said that Esdras was going to be able to walk," said Portillo Estrada in Spanish. "He was advancing, we were close to the goal that he would be able to walk."

Portillo Estrada shared a video of her son making strides at walking using a walker less than four years ago.

"He's not the same kid he was before. He is depressive. He's always sad. He wants to be in bed by himself, scared. He doesn't want to progress in therapy," said Portillo Estrada.

All these changes, Portillo Estrada claims, happened after her son was left unattended at Rocky Mountain Elementary School the morning of May 10, 2022.

"When I got him off the bus, coming down the ramp, I saw that his knees were really swollen, and he looked sad," she said. "When he saw me, he started to cry, and I asked him what happened.  He told me he fell at school."

Portillo Estrada said no one at school told her what happened. She eventually sent Esdras back to classes on May 12. That day, she had to rush her son in pain to the hospital. There, she discovered both of his legs were broken.

"I took him to the emergency room. When they did X-rays, Esdras showed up with big fractures in both of his legs," said Portillo Estrada. "They ask me what happened, and I said I didn't know."

Esdras spent two months recovering in casts, all while Portillo Estrada continued to ask the school district questions about what happened.

"The school told me that Esdras was lying, that he didn't fall at school," she said.

"They were not getting straight answers from the school," said Igor Raykin, the family's attorney. "In fact, the school first had no idea how he was injured, and even denied for a while that he was injured at all. In fact, it took them 22 days to even take a look at the incident on video to determine exactly what happened."

Portillo Estrada kept pressing until she finally was able to see videos from the day of his accident.

"He was completely by himself, and he went down a ramp and he crashed into a wall. All I did was cry, and cry," she said.

"One of the requirements of his special education plan was that he had to be constantly monitored in order to assist him with his movements. He was not supposed to be left alone and left to his own devices," said Raykin.

Now, backed by lawyers, Portillo Estrada and her family hope the district can take accountability for her son's injuries.

"That they're held responsible for Esdras's accident and (we get) justice," said Portillo Estrada.

"She wants to make sure that this sort of thing doesn't happen to anyone else," said Raykin. "This lack of supervision is not something that really should've happened with any child, but particularly on that is as impaired as this particular child."

A spokesperson for the district responded Monday afternoon to the lawsuit filed with a statement:

At this time, the district has yet to be served with a complaint regarding this matter. If we are served with a complaint, the district's practice is not to share information on pending or ongoing litigation.