A senior at Fairfield Ludlowe High School who was forced out of the district months before graduating because of a residency dispute has been allowed to go back to Ludlowe. However, the legal dispute over her residency continues, and if her parents lose, they are on the hook for the district’s legal fees.

Since the start of the school year, Rose and Denis Derosier have been fighting to keep their daughter at Ludlowe. The Derosiers’ daughter, a minor who is referred to as D.D. in court documents, was kicked out of the Fairfield school district months before she was set to graduate because district officials believe she does not meet residency requirements. Since then, the Derosiers and the Fairfield Board of Education (BOE) have been entangled in a series of legal challenges.

The legal battle escalated again in the last few weeks. On April 10, the day before Fairfield’s spring break, a judge determined that D.D. could return to school while the lawsuits were being litigated, citing “irreparable harm.” But on April 20, the BOE appealed that decision, requested that D.D. remain outside the district while the case was ongoing, and that the Derosiers pay any of their legal fees if they lose their appeal to the residency hearing that determined that D.D. lived outside of the district.

The judge upheld the decision for D.D. to return to Ludlowe, and also upheld the BOE’s request to reconsider the judgment. D.D. has been going to classes there since April 22, according to Rose. However, the Derosiers still have to prove that D.D. rightfully belonged in the district, or else they’ll have to pay the BOE’s legal fees.

“They say, even if you have a home, it cannot be for the purpose of school. How is it from the purpose of school when it’s my home?” Rose said. “How do you get to assume it’s for school, my home, where my business also is, where I also run my business. What is wrong with these people?”

The Derosiers own two homes: one in Fairfield, where they used to live full-time with their daughter D.D., and one in Easton, which they purchased in the summer of 2025. D.D. temporarily lived in the Easton house at the start of this academic year while the Fairfield house was being renovated.

The district tried to remove her from Ludlowe because of this living arrangement. However, D.D. eventually moved back into the Fairfield house. Her parents say that the plan was always for her to move back into the house with her older sister once the renovations were done. They say she returned to the school in December.

However, the district claims that she only returned to the house in Fairfield so she could continue to attend Ludlowe, and that she moved back in January.

According to state statute, “Children residing with relatives or nonrelatives, when it is the intention of such relatives or nonrelatives and of the children or their parents or guardians that such residence is to be permanent, provided without pay and not for the sole purpose of obtaining school accommodations.”

Inside Investigator reached out to the BOE through an email with questions about the district’s residency requirements, investigations, and D.D.’s specific case. One of the BOE’s attorneys, Stephen Sedor of Kainen Escalera & McHale PC, was cc-ed on it, as well as other emails about another senior who was removed from the district this year. A reporter also left a message for Sedor at his law firm, asking about both lawsuits. Neither party responded.

The Derosiers are also suing the Connecticut State Department of Education (CSDE). The CSDE did not respond to specific questions about this case.

“Fairfield does not get to dictate African Americans’ lives the way they want to,” Rose said. “And they did an inspection that is so irrational, so irrational, it’s not even funny.”

The district surveilled D.D. at her parents’ house in Easton for weeks for the start of the school year. D.D. said that she has nightmares and has gotten panic attacks while walking alone, because she feels like people are following her.

Denis says he usually doesn’t assume people have racist intentions, but he has no other explanation for the district’s insistence on forcing his daughter out of high school.

One of the reasons he believes the district is acting with prejudice against his daughter is because—he claims—there are multiple white students who live outside of the district but are allowed to attend the schools.

Inside Investigator was able to confirm one student: Katharine Venice’s son, “Randy.”

Throughout the 2024-2025 academic school year, Randy lived in Greenwich with his father, but attended Fairfield’s alternative school, the Walter Fitzgerald Campus (WFC), while his mother lived in Fairfield. The district rerouted a bus to pick Randy up at a train station throughout the academic year, and only attempted to remove him from the district at the start of his senior year, when they determined that his mother had moved to Westchester, New York. Venice says she continued to live in Fairfield, but spent many nights at her boyfriend’s home in Westchester.

Denis believes that the fact that the district was willing to go so far to accommodate Randy, who they knew lived outside the district, and, in contrast, is trying to hard to remove D.D., who they admit lives in the district, is proof of disparate treatment.

“These are all the things that we’re trying to build, but we have to have enough evidence to make sure that we build a case,” he said. “This is really killing my daughter. It’s very sad to see her living with her sister. Even for a party, sometimes she was afraid of coming to our house. It’s crazy. It’s insane, and we have to do something.”

Randy’s landlord told his mother that he had to vacate his residence, because she was scared by cars allegedly surveilling the building they all lived in, people banging on her front door, and threatening to make her pay his tuition.

Randy being told to vacate his home, he is now couch surfing, has led to other legal troubles. Now he is suing the BOE, Fairfield Superintendent Michael Testini, Deputy Superintendent Zakaria Parrish, and WFC Principal Karen Baldwin, claiming they violated the McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act, which guarantees homeless students the right to attend public school.

Neither the BOE, Testini, Parrish, nor Baldwin responded to emails about the lawsuit. Sedor, who is on the legal team representing all of them, was cc-ed on these emails. The message that was left for him through his law firm also mentioned Randy’s case.

Venice told Inside Investigator that she believes the district is trying to remove Randy because his numerous accommodations are taxing on the school. She is suing the BOE and Testini for alleged discrimination against her son on the basis of his disability.

“They need to fix this thing that they have about zoning… because it’s really meant to target a certain group of people,” Rose said. “How can you determine where someone’s home is? Anyone can live anywhere; they don’t have to sleep there every night, and you can’t take that away for your benefit.”

CSDE officials will have to present documents supporting their claim that D.D. is ineligible to attend school in the district by May 1, and trial dates are scheduled for June and July. In the meantime, D.D. will get to finish the year and graduate from Ludlowe High School.

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