A push to spare the 11 former Atlanta Public Schools educators convicted of cheating on standardized tests began Friday, as five of their lawyers filed legal papers asking for bond while they appealed. Supporters announced a vigil calling on the judge to dispense “justice tempered with mercy” when he sentences them.
Ten of the 11 convicted this week of conspiracy to commit racketeering and other felonies are to be sentenced April 13. They are being held in jail until then.
The 11th convicted former teacher, Shani Robinson, was not jailed with the others. Robinson is expected to deliver a son within the next few weeks, so her sentencing will be in August.
Former teacher Dessa Curb was the only defendant acquitted.
Curb and Robinson will be at the vigil Tuesday evening at the First Iconium Baptist Church in East Atlanta, according to two of the defense lawyers, Gerald Griggs and Annette Greene. “Communities have struggled with the next steps and the right decision with regard to sentencing,” they said in announcing the vigil. Griggs represents former Dobbs Elementary School teacher Angela Williamson and Greene represents Robinson.
Griggs and at least four other lawyers filed motions asking Judge Jerry Baxter to allow the convicted former educators to be freed on bond while they appeal this week’s convictions.
All were released on bond two years ago soon after they were indicted, but Wednesday they were immediately taken into custody when the jury’s verdict was announced.
The overall theme in the motions for appeal bonds is the educators are unlikely to flee or contact witnesses if they are released, and they are not dangerous to the community.
Bob Rubin and Ben Davis wrote that they had strong grounds for appeal but it would take a long time to gather required documents and then get through the appellate process.
Rubin represents former Dobbs Elementary School principal Dana Evans, and Davis represents former regional director Tamara Cotman. George Lawson, attorney for former regional director Michael Pitts, and Teresa Mann, who represents former regional director Sharon Davis-Williams, also filed documents asking for appeal bonds.
“It will take close to a year to prepare the transcript and record in this case,” Rubin wrote in his motion. “And it could realistically be several years before the Georgia Court of Appeals considers Dr. Evans’ appeal.”
She could serve all her time before the appellate court decides, Rubin wrote.
All 11 convicted Wednesday are looking at the possibility of decades in prison, though the judge has discretion on the length of their sentences, which could be as much as 20 years. He warned them early in the trial that they should consider pleading to lesser charges because there could be “dire consequences” if they went through a trial and were convicted.
Initially, 35 educators were indicted, including the alleged ringleader, former Superintendent Beverly Hall, accused of conspiring to change answers on the 2009 Criterion-Referenced Competency Test. Twenty-one pleaded guilty to lesser charges and were sentenced to probation. Hall died of breast cancer on March 6, and former D.H. Stanton Elementary School principal Willie Davenport died of cancer a few months after she was indicted.
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