A former Andover High School student and her parents have filed a lawsuit against two teachers, the Town of Andover, and a Cambridge-based travel agency, asserting that the teen was raped on a school trip to Europe three years ago.
The student, then 16, and her parents allege that the assault was caused by the failure of the tour company and the teachers to monitor the students and prevent them from drinking alcohol on the night of the assault, according to court documents filed on Aug. 8.
They also allege that the teachers acted inappropriately, preventing the girl from getting medical assistance or contacting law enforcement. The chaperones, who work at Andover High School, humiliated her in front of her classmates and tried to silence her after the incident, the victim says.
The teachers, Josephine Goldin and Brian Shea, organized the school-sanctioned trip and oversaw the students during their weeklong tour of Austria, Switzerland, and Germany in April 2008.
Trip organizer EF Travel Inc., whose corporate headquarters is in Cambridge, is also listed as a defendant in the 18-page lawsuit filed in the Suffolk Superior Court.
The legal counsel for the school district said the claims are baseless.
“The school district denies the allegations,’’ said John Foskett, the school’s hired counsel, in a brief telephone interview last night. “We don’t think they have any merit.’’
Andover Town Manager Reginald Stapczynski deferred all comments to Foskett.
Goldin also declined to comment when reached by telephone at her home yesterday. Shea did not return repeated phone calls.
The names of the alleged victim and her parents were not released. The girl is referred to as Jane Doe throughout the lawsuit.
The alleged rape occurred in a hotel room in Heidelberg, Germany, on the final night of the trip, hours before the students were scheduled to travel back to Logan International Airport, the documents said.
Aware that Goldin and Shea would follow their predictable pattern of checking the student’s bedrooms, the Andover students planned a hard-liquor party with students from a high school in Milton, Vt., who were sharing the EF Travel tour of Germany. The party began after the teachers’ 11:30 p.m. rounds.
During the party, Jane Doe drank until she was intoxicated, the lawsuit said.
Though the students were not permitted to be in bedrooms with the opposite sex after room check, Doe and two other students joined a male student from Vermont in his bedroom.
After the other two students left, the Vermont student restrained and sexually assaulted Jane Doe without her consent.
The male student was not listed as a defendant in the suit and it was not clear if he was prosecuted.