Very long story, short, at the end of our “parent requested” MDR, LEA decided, despite parents not agreeing, recent behavior was not disability related. While we were standing in office waiting for hard copies of meeting, the school hired EC consultant approached and offered to throw the whole meeting out since it was parent requested. We declined. The last statement in the meeting was from parents asking it be recorded that the LEA making final decisions was also administrator that recommended and was approved an expulsion for the student. Seems very strange, anyone encounter this or have heard of this happening? 

When the breaking of school rules happen, it's generally followed by the school following discipline guidelines which can include expulsion/a switch to alt ed (since school is mandated).  The only exception to this is when the rules were broken due to a manifestation of a disability or the school not following interventions to prevent behavior in the IEP.  The change of placement of a student with an IEP is required to be a team decision.  In other words, you need an IEP meeting to move a special ed student to an alt ed school.

If your child doesn't have an IEP, you can request a special ed evaluation to see if they qualify.  If the school says they don't qualify, you can request an IEE at school expense.  Lisa has info on MDRs on her website:  https://adayinourshoes.com/manifestation-determination-hearing/  I've seen where an academic issue wasn't supported and the student had behaviors so you might want to look beyone the behavor to what's the root cause.