Co-defendant excused from lawsuit

A judge’s order this week removes one of the defendants in a lawsuit filed as the result of an Oconee County student who was sexually abused. The order, by 10th Circuit Judge Lawton McIntosh, dismissed the South Carolina Department of Education as a co-defendant in a case in which the pseudonym “John Doe” is used for the plaintiff’s name. McIntosh’s ruling leaves the Oconee School District and Trey Gardner, a former Walhalla coach and teacher, as the defendants. Gardner is now serving a prison term. The student is now adult and his lawsuit is one of two such cases filed in the Oconee Common Pleas Court.