Teen, Landon Doty, was found guilty on all counts of raping a boy on a Jennings County, Indiana, school bus. Landon was 15 years old at the time he was accused of 11 felonies, including four counts of rape. His victim was a 7-year-old non-verbal autistic boy he sat next to on a special needs school bus.
Having driven a bus for 100 years or so, I can’t even imagine how awful the entire situation is for everyone involved.
This bus had a monitor.
WTHR’s article states that the bus driver first noticed the younger boy sitting on Landon’s lap and alerted the bus monitor. In C’ville, we didn’t have bus monitors… but it seems to me the bus driver shouldn’t have to alert the monitor of anything going on. The monitor should be… ummmm… monitoring.
This case involved incidents from February through mid-April, 2025… all under the watchful eye of the monitor.
Yes, I cut the driver some slack… they’re DRIVING, after all. The Jennings County School Corporation fired both the bus driver and the bus aide shortly after the incidents came to light, but are they they only ones at fault?
It seems like there were so many preventable failures.
Who is responsible for thinking it was a great idea for a non-verbal 7 year-old to be transported with a 15 year-old child with past behavior problems? It wasn’t the bus driver or aide, I can promise you that. A civil lawsuit by the victim’s family alleges negligence by the Jennings County School Corporation.
Now you know: School buses make up the largest mass transit system in the U.S., transporting 26 million students daily. Specifically painted “National School Bus Glossy Yellow” for visibility since 1939, these buses are designed to be 70 times safer than passenger cars. They use “compartmentalization” (padded, high-back seats) rather than seat belts for safety.