GRESHAM, Ore. – Two former Oregon elementary students are suing the Gresham-Barlow School District for $20 million, alleging their principal at Deep Creek Elementary School sexually abused them for years.

The students filed the lawsuit in Multnomah County Circuit Court on Monday against the district and former Deep Creek Elementary School principal Jeff Hays, who left the school in 2009 and now heads City View Charter School, Oregon Live reports.

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The complaint alleges Hays started sexually abusing the students in his office when they were 7 years old in 2005, and it continued for four years. Hays is currently under investigation by the Clackamas County Sheriff’s Office, but has denied any wrongdoing.

“The allegations are false,” he said.

One of the alleged victims, now a 19-year-old woman, said Hays would hold her hand, praise her clothes, and rest his hand on her leg as he asked her questions about her studies. Each time she answered incorrectly, she said Hays would move his hand toward her crotch.

“Hays touched the student’s genitals 20 to 25 times over the three years” from 2005 through 2008, according to the news site.

“The second student, now 16, alleges Hays also sexually abused her in his office between 2007 and 2009.”

“I was suicidal, I hated everything about myself and about my life,” one of the young women who filed the lawsuit told KOIN. “I didn’t think I deserved to be here and I hated myself for how I just… how I felt.”

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The other victim’s mother told the news site her daughter experienced similar psychological trauma, sickness and “feeling like she wasn’t normal.”

“She’d look at me and she’d say, ‘There’s no hope that anybody can fix this,’” the mother said. “At one point she said, ‘I wish I was never born.’ So, as a parent, I don’t know if there’s anything worse that you can hear.”

Officials with the sheriff’s office, school district, and charter school Hays now works for all declined to discuss the situation. Gresham-Barlow officials told KATU they had never received any complaints against Hays during his time at Deep Creek.

“There is no greater betrayal of trust than the sexual abuse of an innocent child,” said Greg Kafoury, attorney representing the victims. “The experience of many children needs to be reconsidered in light of these young women’s revelations.”

One of the victims is suing the district and Hays for $20 million, and the other is seeking “a similar amount,” KOIN reports.

Law enforcement officials have not yet announced whether they plan to charge Hays with a crime. The girls reported the alleged sexual abuse to Clackamas County Sheriff’s Office in September, and the sheriff’s department concluded its investigation in January and forwarded the results to the district attorney, according to KATU.

The district attorney told KOIN prosecutors plan to make a determination about charges by the end of April.