After assault charges, officials say locker room supervision is 'best practice'

After two students were charged with assaulting a 14-year-old in a Lexington High School locker room while no adults were present, officials said adults are not required to supervise school locker rooms.

“There is no board policy that dictates it,” said Mary Beth Hill, spokeswoman for Lexington 1. “We just consider it ‘best practice.’”

Teachers at Lexington High School are expected to supervise classroom activities, but when asked if it’s ever considered appropriate to leave students on their own, Hill said that “common sense prevails.”

The incident happened after a wrestling workout, which Hill said is a physical education class.

Two school employees were placed on administrative leave while the school conducted an internal investigation of the March 10 incident, which Hill said is standard procedure.

“This is as much for their protection as otherwise,” Hill said. “We don’t want anyone to say that the employees influenced the outcome of any investigation in any way and think that is best done in their absence.”

The athletic department “made some adjustments so the wrestling locker room could be monitored better,” according to an incident report from the Lexington County Sheriff’s Department.

The school’s internal investigation showed that no coaches or teachers were present in the locker room when the incident happened, and found no evidence that coaches or teachers knew “that this type of horseplay had been occurring,” officials said in a statement Wednesday.

Preston Edward Painter, 18, and Donald Hinson Lewis, 17, were charged last month with third-degree assault and battery, according to arrest warrants.

Witnesses told a school resource officer that the two students struck a younger student while he was about to shower after the wrestling workout. Painter and Lewis admitted to striking the boy, but said all the wrestlers play around with each other like that, according to the incident report.

A witness said team members always play around, but lately, with the victim, “the guys are taking it too far,” according to the report.

In addition to Painter and Lewis, four other students were disciplined by the school after the incident, the report says.

Painter and Lewis have both requested jury trials, according to Lexington County online court records.

This story was originally published April 14, 2016 at 3:18 PM with the headline "After assault charges, officials say locker room supervision is 'best practice'."