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The Greenville County school district has filed suit against the WH Group, acknowledging that the district mistakenly sold computer equipment that contained confidential information and seeking an order to compel its return.

The school district "did not know of the existence of this confidential data in these locations," the suit says. The district "inadvertently sold the computers, computer equipment or other surplused items with this mislaid information."

The lawsuit, filed late Wednesday but not entered into the Greenville County Clerk of Court's system until Thursday, names Kenneth Holbert Jr. and Scott Mann, both of Easley, as defendants, along with the company they and four other people operate called the WH Group.

Holbert and Mann had spoken through attorneys to remain anonymous while making claims to have accidentally acquired confidential information on computers and hard drives they bought at school district auctions, but the lawsuit makes their identity a matter of public record.

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They have said, through lawyers, that they wanted the story made public because the school district had failed to respond to their repeated warnings.

Greenville attorney David Gantt, who is representing them in the case, declined to comment Thursday.

The suit states that the school district has no record of having ever sold the "logistical server" the men claim to have purchased, and which they say contains the Social Security numbers of more than 59,000 Greenville County students.

The school district "believed the computers and other surplused items to be free of data, specifically confidential data," the suit says. "The existence of confidential data contained on the hard drives or in/on other surplused items was a factual mistake of the school district."

It says the mistake was also the responsibility of the WH Group and that this "mutual mistake" renders the agreement for purchase of the equipment null and void.

The suit goes on to claim that the "school district's mistake has been induced by the fraud, deceit, misrepresentation, concealment, and/or imposition of defendants, without negligence on the part of school district."

It claims that the WH Group contacted a school board member in October 2004 with the information that they were in possession of confidential student data and that "the purpose of the contact ... was to solicit business from the school district in the form of software purchasing."

The lawsuit says the board member set up a meeting between the WH Group and Deputy Superintendent Lonnie Luce, who asked that they return any confidential information. They "refused to return the hardware," the suit says, but "assured the school district that any confidential information would be destroyed."

Holbert and Mann have said through their attorney that they made no such agreement.

The case file also includes an affidavit in which Luce states that the school district "is the owner of confidential data ... contained on hard drives in computers, servers, computer equipment, or other property sold at a district auction of surplus property."

Luce says the value of the equipment is not more than $2,000.

State Sen. David Thomas, an attorney who has been holding a computer for the WH Group, said he had been trying to work out an agreement with the school district's attorneys to turn over the equipment so long as an independent computer expert could be present to document what's on the computer.

In the meantime, he sent an op-ed piece to The Greenville News that stresses his concern that the school district's pursuit of equipment owned by the WH Group is missing the bigger picture.

"It is critical to understand that these men only bought a small fraction of the computers which were sold by the Greenville County school system at these auctions," he wrote.

He repeated his call for the district to take action to protect students in the event that they become victims of identity theft.

"This matter should be handled directly and promptly by the school district and it should disengage from a policy that involves stonewalling, pretending like someone else is at fault and hiring high-price lawyers to cover up their mistake," he wrote.