Corruption – Page 68 – The Pen Hustle With Brandy Cavalli

Top Former Atlanta Educators Sentenced To 20 Years For Racketeering In APS Cheating Scandal

Via CNN:

There was nothing routine about a sentencing hearing Tuesday in Atlanta that wrote the final legal chapter of one of the most massive school cheating scandals in the country.

Educators were convicted April 1 of racketeering and other lesser crimes related to inflating test scores of children from struggling schools. One teacher was acquitted.

One by one, they stood, alongside their attorneys, before Fulton County Superior Court Judge Jerry Baxter.

In this system, a jury decides guilt or innocence, the judge metes out punishment.

Throughout the five-month trial, Baxter has been pointed. Until Monday, he said he planned to sentence the educators to prison. When verdicts were reached, he ordered them directly to jail.

But on Monday he changed his mind and decided to allow prosecutors to offer them deals that would have allowed them to avoid the possible 20-year sentence that racketeering carries.

[See Video] on CNN

And that’s why there were sparks when some of the educators, flanked by their attorneys, did not directly and readily admit their responsibility.

Baxter was not pleased. He raised his voice numerous times and shouted at attorneys. Some attorneys shouted back. At one point, one of the defense lawyers said he might move to recuse the judge and the judge retorted that he could send that attorney to jail.

“Everybody starts crying about these educators. This was not a victimless crime that occurred in this city!” Baxter said.

‘Search your soul’

“Everybody knew cheating was going on and your client promoted it,” Baxter said to an attorney representing Atlanta Public Schools educator Sharon Davis-Williams, who Baxter sentenced to seven years in prison.

Davis-Williams was ordered to perform 2,000 hours of community service and pay a $25,000 fine.

Repeatedly, Baxter appeared frustrated when more educators did not simply accept the deal and plainly vocalize their guilt.

“These stories are incredible. These kids can’t read,” he said.

“This is the time to search your soul,” Baxter said. “It’s just taking responsibility. … No one has taken responsibility that I can see.”

In 2013, a Fulton County grand jury indicted 35 educators from the Atlanta Public Schools district, and more than 20 took a plea deal. Among them were teachers, principals and testing coordinators.

The cheating is believed to date back to 2001, when scores on statewide aptitude tests improved greatly, according to a 2013 indictment. The indictment also states that for at least four years, between 2005 and 2009, test answers were altered, fabricated or falsely certified.

A review that former Gov. Sonny Perdue ordered, determined that some cheating had occurred in more than half the district’s elementary and middle schools.

Michael Bowers, a former Georgia attorney general who investigated the cheating scandal, said in 2013 that there were “cheating parties,” erasures in and out of classrooms, and teachers were told to make changes to student answers on tests.

“Anything that you can imagine that could involve cheating — it was done,” he said at the time.

During his investigation, he heard that educators cheated out of pride, to earn bonuses, to enhance their careers or to keep their jobs, he said.

The cheating allegedly involved the top educator in the district, ex-Atlanta Public Schools Superintendent Beverly Hall.

Hall said she was innocent. Suffering from cancer, she died before she could stand trial.

The sentences

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution‘s investigative journalism is credited with first examining the corruption within the city’s public school system. On Tuesday, the newspaper published photos of each of those who took plea deals and the sentences they received.

* Donald Bullock was first. Witnesses testified that Bullock urged them to change test answers, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported. The former testing coordinator was ordered to serve five years probation, six months of weekends behind bars, pay a $5,000 fine and perform 1,500 hours of community service. As part of his deal, Bullock agreed to waive his right to appeal.

* Angela Williamson, a former teacher, was ordered to serve two years in prison. She was ordered to pay a $5,000 fine and perform 1,500 hours of community service.

* Pamela Cleveland, a former teacher, was ordered to serve one year home confinement, pay a $1,000 fine and perform 1,000 hours of community service. “I am guilty of the charges against me,” Cleveland said in court.

* Michael Pitts, a former schools executive, was accused of telling teachers to cheat and then telling them not to talk to Georgia Bureau of Investigators who were looking into the scandal. He was ordered to serve seven years in prison, perform 2,000 hours of community service and pay a $25,000 fine.

* Tamara Cotman, a former schools administrator, was ordered to serve seven years in prison, pay a $25,000 fine and perform 2000 hours of community service.

* Dana Evans, a former principal, was ordered to serve one year and perform 1,000 hours of community service.

*Tabeeka Jordan, former assistant principal, was ordered to serve two years in prison, perform 1,500 hours of community service and pay $5,000 fine

* Theresia Copeland, a former test coordinator, was ordered to serve one year in prison, perform 1,000 hours of community service and pay a $1,000 fine.

* Diane Buckner-Webb, a former teacher, was ordered to serve one year in prison, perform 1,000 hours of community service and pay a $1,000 fine.

CNN’s Steve Almasy contributed to this report.

Former Commissioner Testifies That Illegal Guns Arrived In Jamaica Ahead Of Tivoli Operation To Apprehend Dudus Coke

ShowerPoseguns — Jamaica’s former Commissioner of Police says a stockpile of illegal guns and other weapons landed in Kingston days prior to the Tivoli raids.

Former commissioner of police Owen Ellington testified that the police got intelligence that an aeroplane with illegal weapons landed at the airstrip in Vernamfield, Clarendon, days before the May 24, 2010 operation to apprehend Christopher ‘Dudus’ Coke.

He testified that the cargo of guns landed on May 20. Ellington, who was being questioned by Peter Champagnie, said the guns did not belong to the police.

The former top cop said he was not immediately made aware of the report of the illegal shipment. He testified also that it had been reported by the police, who were by the Kingston Harbour, that 15 row boats with heavily armed men were heading toward Portmore in St Catherine.

The former commissioner also testified that gangs affiliated with Coke had planned to create disturbances across the island to stretch the resources of the police.

Edited by Paul Henry

Former Commissioner Of Police Says Strongman Dudus Coke Resisted Efforts For Peaceful Surrender During Manhunt

Former Tivoli Gardens don Christopher ‘Dudus Coke is said to have sent a message to Prime Minister Bruce Golding in May 2010 demanding that he “find a way to deal with this” or “come good” if he intended to apprehend him for extradition to the United States.

Former Commissioner of Police Owen Ellington testified yesterday, during the continuation of the Tivoli enquiry at the Jamaica Conference Centre, that the message came through the Reverend Al Miller, whom he had asked to speak to Coke about turning himself in to the police.

Ellington testified that he had asked Miller and then Political Ombudsman Bishop Herro Blair to speak with Coke with the view of securing his peaceful surrender.

He said he spoke with the two clergymen between May 18 and 24, 2010 on the request of a then Government minister, whom he did not identify during his testimony — a stance with which Commission Chairman Sir David Simmons took issue.

“[Rev Miller] returned two days later and said to me, ‘I saw the man and the man say to me that if it was the PNP in power they would know how to deal with it. Tell Bruce Golding to find a way to deal with it. I’m not going anywhere, and if him a come fi mi him haffi come good’,” Ellington said Miller reported back to him.

He said Miller contacted him after the start of the May 24 operation to apprehend Coke to say that he had secured the surrender of a brother and sister of Coke, and that he was still trying to secure the surrender of the then Tivoli Gardens don.

He said he had asked Blair first to talk with Coke about a peaceful surrender. He said Blair, who also went to see Coke in Tivoli Gardens, reported back that Coke said he will not be surrendering. Blair, Ellington testified, said he has had dealings with the military, and that he’d never seen so many rifles in his life as he saw in Tivoli Gardens.

“[He said] he would be praying for me and my officers,” Ellington testified during his evidence-in-chief from Deborah Martin, one of the attorneys for the Jamaica Constabulary Force (JCF).

Prior to Ellington taking the stand at the enquiry looking into the operation to apprehend Coke, Golding who was called back to be questioned by Martin and Queen’s Counsel Jacqueline Samuels-Brown (Miller’s lawyer), said he was “guardedly optimistic” about Miller getting Coke to surrender. He testified that he knew that Miller had contact with the United States Embassy and the police high command about getting Coke to surrender.

Seventy-four civilians were killed in the operation to apprehend Coke and restore law and order to the West Kingston community and its environs.

Questioned on the issue by Garth McBean, QC, the attorney for the commission, Ellington said he had no report as to what number of those who were killed had been shooting at the police.

He had testified earlier that damage to JCF assets as a result of the operation had been calculated at $126 million. And that the list of finds associated with the operation (apart from guns, ammunition and explosives) included police radios, denim similar to that worn by police, gun holster, seven licence plates — including a diplomatic licence plate — and eight ballistic vests.

Jamaica Observer