Supreme Court hears case about whether public schools must reimburse parents who want to send their disabled children to private school

From The NY Times:

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court agreed Friday to decide two cases pitting parents against public schools.

One concerns a 13-year-old honor student who was subjected to a strip search by school officials in Arizona looking for prescription-strength ibuprofen.

The second considers whether public school systems must reimburse parents who choose to send children with disabilities to private school without receiving services from a public program first. The issue may sound familiar, as the court looked at that precise question in 2007, when it found itself in a 4-to-4 deadlock after Justice Anthony M. Kennedy disqualified himself without explanation.

The case, Forest Grove School District v. T.A., No. 08-305, appears to present precisely the same question over which the Supreme Court deadlocked two years ago in a case brought by Tom Freston, former chief executive of Viacom: Does the Individuals With Disabilities Education Act, a federal law, allow courts to make school districts pay for private special education when the students in question have not first received services from a public agency?

In the new case, the parents of a high-school junior in Forest Grove, Ore., identified only as T.A., moved him in 2003 to a residential private school after he experienced emotional and educational difficulties, some relating to drug use. The parents sought reimbursement for $5,200 a month in private-school tuition.

The disabilities law allows courts to require reimbursement for students who have “previously received special education and related services under the authority of a public agency.” T.A.’s parents conceded that they had not received such services.

A divided three-judge panel of the Ninth Circuit said strict adherence to the wording of the statute would lead to an “absurd result” in cases where the school district was uncooperative or could not supply appropriate special education.

It is not clear whether the circumstances that led Justice Kennedy to disqualify himself from the Freston case in 2007 have changed. But the court’s order Friday accepting the new appeal did not indicate any recusals.