Blixt-Leo recovering, Garcia suspended for the year

By Kim Swaney
and Maggie Plummer

For Jeffrey Blixt-Leo, it started out like any other school day.

It was Jan. 10. He never would have predicted that hours later he would suffer a serious head injury that resulted in brain surgery and also caused his long-time buddy Logan Garcia to get suspended from Ronan High School for the rest of the year.

The 14-year-old recalls that shortly before 3:30 p.m. that day he and several other Ronan High School students were throwing mud balls and horsing around. It was the last class of the day - seventh period.

The students had been back from Christmas break for about a week and were still having a hard time settling back into the school routine, Jeffrey said in an interview Monday.

It wasn't the first time the students played around in the greenhouse, he added.

They were supposed to clean the greenhouse for Ms. Gallagher. Water was backed up from the drains. Logan Garcia and others were using push brooms to move the water down the drain.

Jeffrey squirted his friend Logan with the hose. He remembers Logan pushing a broom and then him falling over some hoses that were curled up on the floor.

When the freshman came to, a friend and student tried to help Jeffrey up off the floor. The school's Vice Principal joined Mr. Edington, a teacher, to provide first aid. Then Mr. Edington took Jeffrey to the hospital in his vehicle.

The school called Dureen Blixt, Jeffrey's mother. "Some hysterical person called," Dureen commented, "and said they were bringing my son to the hospital because he had gotten a bump on his head."

She had no idea how severe his accident was until her daughter Darian, a seventh grader, called on her cell phone from the school bus. "Darian said, 'Mom, did you hear what happened to Jeffrey? He got whacked in the head and there was blood everywhere,'" Dureen recalled.

"We were so numb," she said about that day.

School Resource Officer (SRO) Dan McLure attempted to calm her down when Ken called to say that Jeffrey was being Life-flighted to St. Patrick's Hospital in Missoula.

Their hearts sank when the first person to meet them at St. Pat's was the chaplain.

Then came the prognosis from the neurosurgeon, Dr. Chris Mack. He was saying that their son may have to relearn everything, even how to walk. Dr. Mack had to remove three tablespoons of brain matter because the top of Jeffrey's skull had been pushed in.

Dureen said she was delighted when he woke up from the surgery asking for pizza.

The teenager is recovering very well at this point. He came home early last week, and was back in school early this week.

However, the brain injury and surgery may have long-term side effects on his temperament, his doctors have said.

"The police investigated the incident and determined it was an accident," Dureen said.

"We were just playing and laughing around," explained Jeffrey.

Both his family and Logan's family agree that it was an accident.

However, at a recent special meeting, the Ronan school board voted three to two to suspend Garcia for the rest of this school year.

Both families are calling that punishment too severe.

But Ronan School District Superintendent Andy Holmlund said in a telephone interview Monday afternoon that the incident began as horseplay but escalated into something that "went beyond horseplay."

He said that he's "just thankful that the young man who was struck is doing well."

Dureen wonders, if the school believes that it was above and beyond horseplay, why wasn't the policy regarding violence followed and Jeffrey kicked out along with Logan?

Dureen is also critical of how the school handled her son's emergency, pointing out that the staff did not call 9-1-1.

But Holmlund told the Char-Koosta News that "our initial report to the parent was exactly what we'd been told...that was what the student was saying...we responded based on the information we were told, and time provided more information."

The superintendent explained that after his head injury, Jeffrey was "vertical, cognizant, and having a discussion about what had happened." He added that the staff's decision was to not call 9-1-1, having assessed the situation.

Asked how the trustees' voting broke down, the superintendent said that Chris Lynch, Mark Clary, and board chair Joell Conklin voted for Garcia's suspension; Dan Salomon and Stephen McDonald voted against it. Trustees Jason Adams and Roger Romero were absent from the meeting.

Holmlund said that the board's decision to suspend Garcia is final. However, that decision can be appealed to the Lake County Superintendent of Schools and possibly on to the Montana State Superintendent of Schools.

"I don't know if that is happening," Holmlund said of a possible appeal.

Garcia's father, Tracy, found the Ronan trustees' decision surprising. He thinks it makes sense to punish his son for rough-housing, but not to that extent.

He has said the family is pursuing legal avenues.

He and Logan's mother decided to enroll their son in Polson, which requires Polson school board approval.

Polson Schools Superintendent Sue McCormick was not available for comment at press time, but a district clerk said that the Polson trustees held a special board meeting Monday night, during which they approved Logan's enrollment.

Logan will begin attending Polson High School on Jan. 29 - the beginning of a new semester there.

Both Logan and Jeffrey have received the Tribes' annual Tribal Education Department award.

"If Jeffrey wasn't such an over-achiever, this would have nailed him down," his Mom said. He has in the past been chosen as Student of the Year.

He and Logan have been friends since the Leo family returned from New Mexico a few years ago. The youngsters went to Space Camp together, spent the entire summer together and camped out a few times.