It’s time for the jury to decide the APS cheating case

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution will bring you the news immediately when the jury returns its verdicts against 12 former educators on myajc.com for subscribers, and at www.ajc.com. Our blog at http://news.blog.ajc.com/ will post verdicts and reactions as they come out, and you can get it as it happens by following our Twitter account @gaschoolsnews.

Finally, more than six months after they were picked to serve on the jury, six men and six women will decide who the victims were in the Atlanta Public Schools cheating case: the students alone, or 12 former educators as well.

The jurors will arrive in Fulton County Superior Court today to hear an explanation of the law before they disappear into a back room to decide the outcome of this historic case.

They will have to discern between two competing views. One depicts the dozen defendants — former teachers, testing coordinators and administrators — as a selfish gang out to fatten their own pockets at the expense of students. The other has them as David fighting Goliath, a state that poured untold resources into an investigation that ensnared innocent bystanders.

On Wednesday, lawyers on both sides concluded 17 hours of closing arguments spanning three days. It took that long to sum up the nearly five months of testimony from 162 witnesses.

Before releasing the jurors, Judge Jerry Baxter told them he expects their deliberations to take a “long time.”

He advised them to get some rest.

Whatever their decision, the case has already left its mark on Atlanta, a name that has become synonymous across the country with cheating on tests.

“Help our community heal,” said Clint Rucker, chief senior assistant district attorney. He urged the jury to do the “right thing” and find the defendants guilty.

Of course, defense attorney Teresa Mann, who represents former APS regional director Sharon Davis-Williams, had a different idea of the right thing.

Mann said the investigation undertaken by the governor’s office, with help from the GBI, should never have targeted her client. The district attorney never should have taken the case, she added.

“The truth and the right things should have been done over four years ago and we wouldn’t be here today,” Mann said. “They’re supposed to seek justice, and I just do not feel justice has been sought in this case by the prosecutors. So I’m asking you to seek that justice when you seek the truth.”

The defendants are accused of conspiring to change answers on the 2009 Criterion-Referenced Competency Test so inflated scores would help the Atlanta school district meet benchmarks set by federal law.

Thirty-five Atlanta educators were indicted two years ago. One died before the trial’s start. Another, former superintendent Beverly Hall — whose case was severed while she underwent treatment for breast cancer — died on March 2, six days after the last witness testified. Twenty-one pleaded guilty to less serious crimes, some of them testifying in this case.

If convicted on the racketeering charge, the defendants could be sentenced to up to 20 years in prison. Many of them are charged with additional felonies that also carry stiff sentences.

George Lawson, who represents another former APS regional director, Michael Pitts, said his client was a scapegoat for an age-old problem.

“Let’s be realistic. There was some cheating at APS,” Lawson said. “There’s probably someone cheating at APS today, and in Gwinnett (County), in Cobb, in Douglas.”

The prosecution argued that while some APS educators were dismissed for missing test score goals, those educators who allegedly cheated got to keep their jobs, or got raises. The prosecution contended the educators joined the conspiracy in part because they wanted the cash that comes with success.

But Mann pointed out that the dozen defendants collectively garnered only $1,500 in bonuses.

In contrast, Hall, who was alleged to have spearheaded the purported conspiracy, made $294,381 in bonuses from 2006 through 2009.

Wednesday afternoon, during his last words to the jury, Rucker noted that the defense attorneys did not talk in their closing arguments about children who had suffered. Because of misleading test scores, struggling students lost out on tutoring programs that the federal government would have funded. According to testimony, APS could have received $8 million in aid had test scores reflected reality.

“Y’all heard 12 hours of (closing arguments) and not one mention of a child. From nobody. Nothing. Why?” Rucker said. “How do you hear everything you’ve heard in these past few months and say nothing about those kids?”