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FBI agent could be added to the lawsuit, attorney says
A former Mount St. Joseph University graduate student who declined to receive the COVID vaccine continues to pursue his federal lawsuit against two campus police officers who he alleges violated his Fourth Amendment rights by detaining him and berating him about his decision.
Former nursing student Matthew Warman is also seeking to add an FBI agent to his lawsuit, the veteran’s attorney told The College Fix during a phone interview on Monday, June 1.
The lawsuit focuses on whether police officers employed by a private university can violate a student’s Fourth Amendment rights while carrying out law enforcement duties. Warman, a Catholic, has moral objections to the COVID shot.
In a phone interview with The Fix, the lead counsel on Warman’s case said his client has filed a companion suit against an FBI agent who was involved in the school’s retaliation against him, alongside a motion to amend his complaint. Currently, he is waiting for a response from a federal judge, who is trying to consolidate the two cases.
Attorney Ron Berutti said Warman wants to be able to amend his complaint, then get compensation for the “egregious” way in which he was treated by Mount St. Joseph, its employees, and the FBI agent. He is also seeking punitive damages against the school.
“The facts of the case are absolutely horrific, and the treatment he received was something out of a really bad movie. We hope we get justice for Matthew,” Berutti told The Fix on Monday. “We [are trying to] dial back the excesses of universities and school boards who believe they have the unfettered right to do whatever they wish to people as if rules don’t apply to them.”
This update follows a dispute between both sides regarding whether Warman should be able to file a third amended complaint.
In a November 2025 filing, the attorneys representing Mount St. Joseph denied allegations from Warman’s team that the defense counsel acted inappropriately during negotiations over proposed changes to the complaint.
According to the filing, the defense attorneys allowed Warman to submit a revised complaint only after earlier versions allegedly added new defendants and included claims that had previously been dropped. Because of this, the defense argued it retains the right to challenge the revised complaint in court.
Mount St. Joseph’s attorneys also stated they formally notified the court in October 2025 they intended to oppose parts of the amended complaint, and since Warman’s attorneys did not initially object, they could not later claim they were misled.
The defense counsel’s filing included email exchanges between both side’s attorneys discussing their proposed revisions to the lawsuit, where they agreed to uphold a tortious inference claim against university employees but disputed whether certain state-law claims should remain.
The school’s attorneys did not respond to multiple requests for comment via email in the past two weeks. The Fix asked for the current status of the lawsuit, a response to the ruling, and an account of the interaction.
This dispute came after a July 2025 U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit ruling that Warman plausibly alleged a Fourth Amendment violation. The court dismissed his other claims but found the officers may have acted “under the color of the law,” meaning they could be treated as government actors even though Mount St. Joseph is a private institution.
Vaccine pressure is common, medical freedom advocate says
An organization that advocates against higher education vaccine mandates said other students are also seeking justice for past shot requirements.
The co-founder of No College Mandates said the group is not involved in Warman’s case but is “happy to see students and/or former students standing up for their rights that were violated during pandemic times.”
Lucia Sinatra said there were multiple cases where students were “pressured to comply and discriminated against” for not doing so. Consequences for disobeying the vaccine requirement were often through administrative measures like restricting student accounts or withholding diplomas.
Sinatra cited two cases in New Jersey, one settled and one pending. Both are represented by John Coyle of Coyle Law Group, who also spoke to The Fix.
One case was against Ramapo College of New Jersey for removing a nursing student from the program over being unvaccinated. Ramapo College settled and paid the student more than $100,000 to settle.
No College Mandates shared a statement from Coyle: “While there was no formal admission of liability — that is standard in settlements — when a public college writes a six-figure check, their actions speak for themselves.”
The other case is Whartenby et al. v. Rowan College at Burlington County, in which the school denied four students religious exemptions from the COVID vaccine. Through discovery, Coyle learned the deans and heads at Rowan College specifically instructed employees to keep quiet about where students can obtain exemption information.
One student was told “the college does not recognize religious exemptions just for the COVID vaccine, that students cannot write their own exemption letters, and that the only students who might qualify for a religious exemption are those who can prove they have never had a vaccine in their entire lives — and must provide a letter from the head of their church.”
The class-action lawsuit is ongoing.
“[T]he law is on the side of students who hold sincere religious beliefs, [and] the shell game can be exposed,” Coyle stated.
