On February 18, 2022, an 11-year-old student at Homan Elementary School in Fresno walked into the school nurse’s office struggling to breathe. She had already used her inhaler six times. She needed a wheelchair to be transported. By the time she reached the hospital, she was in cardiac arrest. She died of an anoxic brain injury.

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Now, more than four years later, California’s Board of Registered Nursing has formally accused both the nurse who treated her and the supervisor who investigated her death of incompetence and unprofessional conduct, and has referred both cases to the state Attorney General’s Office with a recommendation that their licenses be revoked or suspended. The case has exposed a pattern of nepotism and cover-up that reaches into the highest levels of Fresno Unified’s administration.

What the Nurse Did — and Didn’t Do

According to the Board of Registered Nursing’s accusation against Lydia Chrisel White, the student arrived at the nurse’s office in severe respiratory distress after using her inhaler six times in the classroom without relief. What happened next was a series of failures, each documented by the board:

White never called 911. Despite noting in her own records that the student “should be referred to a physician or the emergency department,” White contacted the student’s family to come pick her up instead. She never administered rescue medication. She did not document the student’s vitals — no blood pressure, no respiratory rate, no skin color, no assessment of speaking ability or muscle use during breathing. The student did not have an Asthma Action Plan on file, despite a Fresno Unified policy requiring one for all asthmatic students.

Fresno Unified’s own standard asthma protocol states that nurses should call an ambulance first, and the family second. White reversed that order — and then did not call an ambulance at all.

The student was picked up by a grandparent. Her condition worsened on the way to the hospital. She went into cardiac arrest and was pronounced dead of an anoxic brain injury.

After the student’s death, White did not report the office visit to the administration for appropriate follow-up or investigation.

The board’s accusation against White also covers a separate incident two weeks before the student’s death, in which White allegedly misdiagnosed a broken wrist — giving the student an ice pack, leaving to treat other patients, and never obtaining the student’s name or fully assessing the injury. That student was later taken to the emergency room by a parent.

When Fresno Unified learned of the student’s death, the district tasked nurse Xai Elizabeth Torres with conducting the investigation. Torres was White’s immediate supervisor — and, according to the whistleblower lawsuit, her friend.

Torres is also a relative of Fresno Unified Superintendent Misty Her. A previous lawsuit accused the superintendent of nepotism, alleging she encouraged Torres to apply for the Director of Health Services role despite Torres holding her nursing credential for less than three years at the time.

The investigation Torres conducted was, according to the whistleblower lawsuit, completed in only a few hours. The Board of Registered Nursing found that Torres:

Did not create a written report of the investigation
Never documented what discipline, if any, occurred
Never explained what coaching, if any, was provided
Did not review medical records related to the student’s care
Did not interview family members or medical providers

It was not until a whistleblower nurse filed a lawsuit against the district two years later that Fresno Unified took action against Torres. The whistleblower had received a letter of reprimand from the district for accessing the deceased student’s medical records while attempting to document what had happened — he maintains that did not violate privacy laws.

Torres was placed on paid administrative leave in late 2024. She separated from the district in February of this year. She has since started a consulting business focusing on special education and health.

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The nursing board’s actions are the latest chapter in a broader institutional failure that has cost Fresno Unified millions of dollars and is still unfolding in court.

Earlier this year, the district paid a $1.76 million settlement to three school nurses who sued alleging age discrimination — claiming Torres had given positions to younger nurses and passed them over for promotions. Multiple additional lawsuits naming Torres, Superintendent Her, and Amy Idsvoog — the health department director at the time of the student’s death who had no medical background — are still working through the courts.

Idsvoog, who oversaw the district’s health and security personnel despite no medical qualifications, is married to Fresno Unified’s Director of Operational Services. A separate lawsuit alleges her husband conditioned his own employment at the district on his wife being hired as well. Idsvoog has since been reassigned to a different role.

The Board of Registered Nursing’s recommendation that both Torres and White face license revocation or suspension now goes to the California Attorney General’s Office, which will determine how to proceed. Both nurses could also be fined for the cost of the investigation.

For school nurses specifically, this case is a direct reminder of what the standard of care requires — and what the consequences are when it fails. Fresno Unified’s own written policy stated the protocol clearly: call an ambulance first. That protocol existed because a child in severe asthma distress who has already exhausted her rescue inhaler cannot wait for a family member to arrive. The decision not to call 911 was not a clinical gray area. The board’s accusation makes that plain.

Documentation matters just as much. The absence of a recorded Asthma Action Plan, the absence of documented vitals, the absence of any post-death reporting — each of those gaps contributed to an institutional failure that took four years and a whistleblower lawsuit to surface.

For nurses working in any school or institutional setting, the systemic failures on display here — a friend investigating a friend, a supervisor appointed through nepotism, a department director with no medical background — are not unique to Fresno. They are the conditions under which individual nurses can find themselves making decisions without adequate oversight, training, or accountability. Knowing the written protocol, documenting every clinical encounter, and reporting concerns through formal channels are not just professional obligations. In a case like this one, they are the difference between a record that protects patients and a record that does not exist at all.

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Published on

July 7, 2026

Written by

Nurse.org Staff