The attorney for a Gwinnett teacher arrested Wednesday on a charge of sexually assaulting a student is citing a legal technicality to defend his client.
James Everette Buckland, a 5-year Gwinnett schools employee was arrested on charges of sexual assault and sexual battery. He is being held in Gwinnett County jail and was denied bond on the felony charge of sexual assault. There is a $5,000 bond on the misdemeanor sexual battery charge.
The arrest warrant states that bond was denied because Buckland is a “danger to community.”
A 16-year-old at Norcross High School said that Buckland, an instructor in Summerour Middle School’s Junior Leadership Corps program, touched her inappropriately when she returned Sept. 15 for a visit to Summerour, which she formerly attended.
Buckland’s lawyer, Eric Crawford, said the charge is legally flawed because under Georgia law the student has to be enrolled in the school where the instructor teaches, “which is clearly not the case here,” he wrote in a Facebook post.
Buckland, 43, of Loganville, resigned his position last week during a human resources investigation into the allegations that began on Sept. 30, Gwinnett County Public Schools spokeswoman Sloan Roach said.
In a motion for bond filed in Gwinnett County superior court Wednesday, Crawford noted that the pertinent part of the law reads: “A person who has supervisory or disciplinary authority over another individual commits sexual assault when that person is a teacher, principal, assistant principal, or other administrator of any school and engages in sexual contact with such other individual who the actor knew or should have known is enrolled at the same school …”
The criminal arrest warrant for the sexual assault states that, “Accused did make physical contact of a sexual nature while he was employed as a school teacher and the victim was a student on school grounds during school hours.”
On the charge of sexual battery, the warrant states that the accused used his hands to make physical contact with intimate parts of the victim without the victim’s consent.
Crawford wrote in the Facebook post that he is “comfortable” with the planned defense to the sexual battery charge, and he said Buckland is “looking forward to having his day in court to challenge that allegation as well.”
Crawford said Buckland had no criminal record and that he used his training from nearly two decades in the U.S. Army to help start the Junior Leadership Corps program at Summerour.
According to a Gwinnett schools website for the Summerour program, the Junior Leadership Corps is a two-year course for middle school students that “grew out of a joint vision between the U.S. Army and the National Association of State Boards of Education.”
The mission of the program “is to influence students to be motivated to achieve their academic goals and to be successful, productive leaders who make a difference in their communities.”
The Junior Leadership Corps was the only program Buckland worked with, Roach said.
