More than a year after 16-year-old Luis Garcia was shot and killed in his car outside of East High School, his family has filed a lawsuit against Denver Public Schools, arguing officials “subverted” the security by removing police officers from the campus.    

The wrongful death lawsuit — filed on Monday on behalf of the family by the Barringer Law Firm — said the school did not protect its students from “serious” risk.

“East High School subverted and weakened the security and safe environment of the school by removing all professionally trained and armed School Resource Officers (hereinafter ‘SRO’), thereby undermining the deterrent effect of having an armed SRO within the school and allowing the potential shooters to believe they would be able to execute an attack without armed or other formal law enforcement resistance,” the attorneys said in the lawsuit.

Around 2:30 p.m. on Feb. 13, police discovered Garcia — a junior at East High School who played on the varsity soccer team — sitting in his car on the northside of campus with gunshot wounds. 

A juvenile suspect allegedly stole a white Kia Sportage the same morning, according to the lawsuit.

The suspect allegedly drove through a red light and toward Garcia’s vehicle at a “high rate of speed.” The suspect then pulled up next to the car and allegedly fired around five shots at Garcia, hitting him in the head, according to witnesses.

The victim was taken to a nearby hospital, where he died two weeks later.

The suspect dumped the stolen vehicle in an alley around four miles away, the police said. 

The Denver Police Department has still not made any arrests in connection to the shooting and the Denver District Attorney’s Office has not filed any official charges. There are no new developments in the case. 

The Denver School Board unanimously voted to remove school resources officers in June 2020, following the public outcry and nationwide protests over the murder of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police.

Just a month after Garcia’s death, on March 22, a student shot two deans at the school on March 22, 2023.

After the shooting, Denver Public Schools’ board members reversed course and decided to return school resource officers to the city’s schools. The board crafted the policy behind closed doors. 

Garcia’s family had filed a wrongful death notice of claim against Denver Public Schools in May 2023, seeking damages in excess of $1 million. The notice is a legal requirement before any action is brought against a public entity.

“This lawsuit is about accountability and ensuring that no other family endures the heartbreaking loss the Garcia family has suffered,” a spokesperson for Barringer Law Firm said in a news release. “Our goal is to shine a light on the systemic failures at East High School and DPS, so that student safety is prioritized moving forward.”

The lawsuit claimed that DPS and East High School failed to uphold their legal duty under the Claire Davis School Safety Act, a state law enacted in 2015 that allows parents to sue a school if it does not provide “reasonable care” to protect students and employees from possible violence.

The law firm said that both Denver Public School District and the Denver Public School Board had actual notice of “multiple violent events” at East High School prior to the shooting, according to the court documents.

Eric Sinclair and Jerald “Wayne” Mason, the two deans shot in March 2023, also filed a notice of claim in September 2023 against the school and district. 

In his claim, Sinclair said the assistant principal and the student safety coordinators failed to follow proper safety protocols. The claim said that, a few weeks before the shooting, a student reported seeing the shooter, Austin Lyle, with a gun in class. When DPS employees tried to search the student, the claim said, he ran from the school but was later permitted to return to class.

“The legal proceedings are expected to bring critical attention to how public schools manage security in the face of rising violence and the consequences of neglecting student safety,” attorneys for Garcia’s family said.

Denver Public Schools declined to comment. 

Garcia’s murder and the deans’ shooting set of a wave of student and parent protests at East High School and at the Colorado state Capitol. Students said they did not feel safe.