After he reported that a teacher was emotionally abusing his daughter, a father says the Park City School District investigated his allegations, concluded they were “unsubstantiated,” then refused to provide him a copy of the investigation.
Now, he’s suing.
The father, Bryan Knepper, alleges the abuse occurred between 2023 and 2025 and left his then-10-year-old daughter so distressed that the family withdrew her from Trailside Elementary and enrolled her at a private school in Sandy.
Counselors at that new school recommended that the girl, Isabelle, repeat fifth grade, court filings state. The father alleges they made that recommendation because of the trauma she experienced.
Knepper in separate lawsuits is suing both the Park City School District and his daughter’s former fifth grade teacher, Patricia French. The complaints accuse the district of negligence and allege French “willfully” inflicted emotional abuse. Attempts to reach French for comment were not immediately successful.
The lawsuits also argue the district failed to protect the girl under Section 504, a federal law requiring schools to provide equal access for students with disabilities.
Park City School District officials in a statement said they could not comment on the pending litigation.
Both lawsuits were filed last month in Summit County’s 3rd District Court, seeking damages for emotional distress, “lost educational opportunity” and the nearly $30,000 the family has since spent on private school tuition.
In an interview, Knepper told The Salt Lake Tribune he “couldn’t care less” about the money.
Instead, he said, the lawsuits stem from a monthslong effort to understand how the district internally investigated his allegations, as indicated in emails he shared with The Tribune.
“It just doesn’t make sense,” Knepper said. “If no findings were found, why won’t they share them?”
He added: “I’m not seeking money. I’m seeking the report.”
What happened?
(Trent Nelson | The Salt Lake Tribune) The Park City School District offices.
At the start of the 2024-2025 school year, Knepper’s daughter was struggling with a few behavioral issues, he said.
But after meeting with Trailside staff and establishing a 504 plan — which provides accommodations for students with disabilities, such as extra time on assignments — Knepper felt things were resolved.
Neither he nor his wife heard concerns from French during their many parent-teacher conferences, he said, and school administrators raised no new issues.
But near the end of April 2025, he alleges, the school’s then–dean told him that French was emotionally abusing his daughter. The Tribune attempted to contact the former dean, who no longer works there and is not named as a defendant, but was unsuccessful.
Knepper told The Tribune the dean met with his daughter multiple times. During those meetings, the girl told the administrator that French “encouraged other students to bully her,” called her “stupid,” and frequently “belittled” her in front of her classmates, the father said.
In one April 30 email that the father sent to the dean, according to a copy shared with The Tribune, Knepper wrote that he would be removing his daughter from the school.
“Thank you for meeting yesterday,” Knepper wrote. “... We agree with your recommendation and assessment that Trailside is unsafe and that Isabelle has suffered significant and repeated trauma at the hands of Mrs. French. Isabelle’s therapist agreed with immediately removing Isabelle from the school system to stop the daily trauma exposure. As a result, Isabelle will not be attending Trailside anymore.”
Knepper said he then filed a formal complaint with the district.
A fight for transparency
(Francisco Kjolseth | The Salt Lake Tribune) Bryan Knepper, who is is suing the Park City School District, alleging a teacher emotionally abused his daughter, is pictured on Thursday Dec. 11, 2025.
Emails shared with The Tribune indicate that French was placed on administrative leave on May 1.
“We’ve initiated an investigation and the employee has been placed on leave pending its outcome,” Superintendent Lyndsay Huntsman wrote to the father.
Over the course of the next few weeks, email records show Knepper tried to check in with district officials on multiple occasions.
On May 14, Huntsman provided an update in a letter.
“As I have said in several prior communications, that investigation is ongoing,” Huntsman wrote. She noted that the district’s Title IX coordinator was performing the investigation and that Knepper had declined an in-person interview with the official.
The letter went on to note that Knepper’s allegations had been immediately reported to Utah’s Division of Child and Family Services.
“At the conclusion of the investigation, you will be informed as to whether disciplinary action has been taken but you will not be provided with specifics regarding action that is taken, “ Huntsman wrote.
Nearly two weeks later, on May 27, Huntsman notified Knepper in an email that the investigation was complete and “the allegation of abuse was unsubstantiated.”
Huntsman noted the district interviewed four students and nine adults, two of whom were interviewed “multiple times.”
Knepper quickly responded with a slew of questions.
“How did you determine which 4 students to interview?” he wrote. “Or which 9 adults? These are meaningless data points.”
A day later, Knepper filed a public records request for the district’s investigation as well as French’s employment record. The district denied his request, citing student privacy concerns, the email records show.
On June 3, he appealed, requesting a redacted version of the investigation. In a second letter from the district dated June 10, that appeal was also denied.
“Where the charges raised by the complaint were not sustained, neither wholesale release nor redaction of the resulting records are appropriate,” wrote the district’s chief records officer.
The letter noted Knepper had a right to appeal the decision or mediate any disputes through the state’s government records ombudsman.
After one July 31 mediation session, the district released French’s employment record, which showed that on Jan. 24, the district had notified her that it would not extend her contract.
But over the next few months, he never saw investigative documents. That’s when he decided to sue.
Knepper told The Tribune he would drop the lawsuits he filed if he could review the investigation.
“I just want accountability,” he said.
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