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Seminole ex-teacher gambles and loses
January 27, 2007
By: Rene Stutzman
GUILTY ON 1 COUNT: Pinning autistic
boy to desk
SENTENCING: Kathleen Garrett faces up to 5 years in prison
 SANFORD
-- Kathleen Garrett had gambled before and won. When the mother of
an autistic child complained seven years ago that Garrett was an
abuser, she fought back and kept her teaching job.
And earlier this month she rejected
a plea deal, gambling that she would beat a second round of
child-abuse complaints.
But on Friday, the gamble failed.
Jurors convicted her of pinning a 60-pound boy to the top of his
desk, his head hanging off the edge, and staying on top of him until
his lips turned blue.
Garrett, 50, who spent 26 years
teaching disabled children in Seminole County public schools, faces
up to five years in prison. She is to be sentenced March 7.
She left the courthouse late Friday
afternoon without comment, free on $7,000 bail. Her lawyer also
would not comment.
Although now a felon, Garrett
overcame four other counts of felony child abuse that could have
sent her to prison for up to 75 years.
Jurors acquitted her on a charge of
bending backward the thumb of an autistic boy. A judge threw out two
other counts and, just as the trial got under way, prosecutors
abandoned a fifth charge, the most serious.
Even so, the mother of the boy with
the bruised thumb said the one conviction was enough.
"I was very happy," she said. "We
got her on child abuse. . . . Children are safe."
The mother of a girl who accused
Garrett of slamming her head onto her desk seven years ago at a
different school, though, had hoped for more.
"I'm happy for the one conviction,
but I wish prosecutors could have brought charges to defend every
child that she has hurt," the woman said.
Carolyn Tavel, past president of
the Learning Disabilities Association of Florida, said jurors never
got to decide some of the more serious allegations against Garrett.
"The individuals involved in this
are still hurting," said Tavel, who counseled several of the parents
whose children were in Garrett's class at South Seminole Middle
School.
Garrett resigned shortly after her
arrest in November 2004. Her teaching certificate expired 18 months
ago.
Garrett took a chance two weeks ago
when she rejected a plea deal that would have placed her on five
years of probation. She has maintained she did not abuse any of the
students.
Her trial began Monday, and for
much of the week, it appeared her gamble might pay off. Piece by
piece, the case against her crumbled.
On Monday, prosecutors dropped the
first count, that she had slammed a boy's head down on his desk,
breaking two of his front teeth. No one saw what happened. Then
Friday morning, Circuit Judge Clayton Simmons dismissed two other
counts. One was an allegation that Garrett had lifted a boy from his
chair and flung him toward a cabinet.
The other was that she had "caged"
a blind, autistic student by placing him in a large closet. Simmons
wrote that the Florida Legislature did not intend for parents to
face a possible prison sentence every time they send a child to his
room for time-out.
In the end, jurors were left with
just two incidents to judge.
Assistant State Attorney Donna
Goerner told the panel of five men and one woman, all parents, that
there still was enough evidence to convict. Two teacher aides
testified they were in the classroom when both boys were hurt.
Jurors would not discuss the
verdict.
None of the victims appeared in
court. None is mentally competent, and most cannot talk, witnesses
testified.
Autism is a developmental disorder
with wide-ranging symptoms. They are mild in some people but severe
in others. Many lead normal lives. Some symptoms include repetitive
motion, such as swaying; repeating words; and self-injury, such as a
child hitting his head against his knee.
The parents of some autistic
children said they were horrified by what teacher aides said went on
in Garrett's classroom: swatting, punching, ear flicking.
"That is not how you discipline a
child who is autistic," Tavel said.
Seminole School Superintendent Bill
Vogel called the incident in Garrett's classroom "extremely
isolated."
Since her arrest, the School Board
has toughened its policy on the reporting of child abuse. It is also
giving its teachers assigned to autistic classes more training and
moving their classrooms into higher-traffic areas, Vogel said.
"These are children," Goerner said,
"who cannot speak for themselves."
Robert Perez and Dave Weber of the
Sentinel staff contributed to this report. Rene Stutzman can be
reached at rstutzman@orlandosentinel.com or 407-324-7294.
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