Defense rests in APS cheating trial

The background: A special investigation, prompted by Atlanta Journal-Constitution reporting, concluded there had been organized cheating on the 2009 Criterion-Referenced Competency Tests. Several educators charged pleaded guilty to lesser charges and some testified at the trial for the prosecution.

The key issue: Whether the defendants engaged in a conspiracy to inflate scores on standardized tests

The key figure: Former superintendent Beverly Hall, who was charged but isn't on trial with these 12 defendants because of her advanced cancer. She is to be tried separately if her health improves enough to allow it.

The next step: A conference among the lawyers and judge March 11 to discuss instructions to jurors

The finish: "We're not over yet. The ultimate decisions will be in your lap and that's coming soon," Judge Jerry Baxter told jurors Tuesday, when the defense rested and testimony concluded. Lawyers will make closing arguments March 16 and the jury will begin deliberating.

CONTINUING COVERAGE

In 2008, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution broke the first of what would be several stories highlighting suspect test scores in Atlanta Public Schools and other Georgia districts. In the years that followed, the newspaper kept digging, and eventually special investigators appointed by the governor exposed widespread cheating in the 50,000-student APS district. The APS trial is the latest chapter in that coverage. Follow along on MyAJC.com, where our coverage includes online-only extras such as photo galleries, videos and more.

Were they lying, cheating villains or caring, committed educators?

Soon, jurors who have tried to absorb nearly five months of testimony in the Atlanta Public Schools conspiracy trial will have to filter through their notes and memories to decide.

Testimony ended Tuesday, more than a month earlier than expected. The defense presented less than a quarter of the number of witnesses the prosecution did.

The verdict, which will not come until after court resumes next month, will no doubt linger in the lore of Atlanta for years to come. The city has become synonymous nationally with test-cheating since the scandal surfaced.

During four months of testimony, the Fulton County District Attorney’s office had called 131 witnesses (plus two more Tuesday) to paint the dozen defendants as a selfish gang that coordinated their actions to defraud the government, cheat students and advance or keep their own careers.

Then, over just two weeks, lawyers for several defendants called 29 witnesses to describe the opposite: hardworking, honest people just trying to do a job.

“They were excellent teachers. They didn’t have to cheat,” said Deborah Bythwood, a former teacher who retired from Dobbs Elementary School, where three of the accused worked: teachers Angela Williamson and Dessa Curb and principal Dana Evans.

Evans was called a “visionary” by another Dobbs employee who testified for the defense.

Only those three and former regional supervisor Michael Pitts called witnesses.

Lawyers for the other eight defendants relied on their prior cross-examinations of state witnesses, many of whom were tainted by their own admissions of guilt or their disciplinary records.

For instance, jurors learned last week that prosecution witness Vera Yates had been disciplined when she was a teacher at Dobbs. Atlanta schools investigator Alero Afejuku told the jury that Yates had stood by as students in her classroom engaged in sexual acts, and the students “weren’t afraid Ms. Yates would see them. One of them said, ‘No. She doesn’t pay attention.’ ”

Yates had testified in January that she saw Evans holding a pencil eraser over a test sheet.

The trial follows nearly a decade of suspicions raised by articles in The Atlanta Journal-Constitution that noted unlikely gains in scores on the state-mandated Criterion Referenced Competency Tests. The federal government was demanding ever-improving scores, and Superintendent Beverly Hall was demanding even better results. She made it clear she would replace employees who couldn’t produce them.

Hall was indicted with the other defendants but is not on trial now because she has advanced cancer.

The lists of charges against each defendant differ — many were accused of submitting false records — but all have one charge in common: conspiracy under Georgia’s Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act. A guilty verdict can bring 20 years in prison, so the defense has hammered away at that one.

Prosecutors allege that pressure from Hall’s office led leaders such as Evans to turn the screws on their teachers, with a wink and a nudge that suggested tampering with tests was the way to get the desired results.

One prosecution witness uttered a line that crystallized the menace from the top and the powerlessness at the bottom. The former teacher said Evans told teachers who couldn’t hack it that “Wal-Mart is always hiring.”

Defense attorneys called witnesses to counter that narrative. They did not, however, call their clients to testify.

Veteran defense attorney Jack Martin said that is understandable. Martin, who was not involved in the trial but has followed coverage of it, said sometimes it’s better to let the jury focus on the prosecution’s evidence, or lack of it, than drawing their minds to the words and demeanor of a client. The jury expects emotions to match the testimony, which doesn’t always happen except with actors.

“You might be absolutely innocent, but the jury expects you to be perfect,” he said.

The trial will resume March 16. That means jurors will be making a decision nearly half a year after they heard the first witness on Sept. 30.

Attorney Jeff Brickman, a former DeKalb County prosecutor who represented a now-deceased defendant in this case, said the closing arguments will be crucial.

“Given the amount of evidence and the number of witnesses, the number of charges and the nature of the charges, it will be critical for them to explain it in an easy to understand fashion, but with emotion,” Brickman said.

One major question remains in his mind: Will each defense attorney point a finger at other defendants, saying his or her own client didn’t participate in the conspiracy, or will the defendants stand unified and assert that no conspiracy existed at all?