The Tonya Craft trial — the Chickamauga battle that became national news — is over. Tonya Craft, former kindergarten teacher, was acquitted on Tuesday of all 22 counts of child molestation she had been charged with. Of course, the timing was after she lost her house, her job as Chickamauga Elementary School, and racked up legal fees around $ 500,000. Tonya Craft has also been separated from her two children for 712 days.
Tonya Craft trial a ‘witch hunt’
Tonya Craft supporters characterized the trial as a “witch hunt,” and legal bloggers covering the Tonya Craft trial reported that the prosecutors and judge conspired for a Tonya Craft conviction. After her exoneration, Tonya Craft was on the “Today” show Wednesday morning and can be featured on Larry King Live Wednesday night.
Tonya Craft on ‘Today’
Tonya Craft's verdict kept her from getting sentenced to 400 years in prison. She might end up needing a installment loan for all those legal costs. She told NBC's "Today" on Wednesday that it wasn't a victory because of that very reason. “There’s nobody that wins in this situation. My whole heart has been taken, and I got half of it back.” Craft told host Meredith Vieira she was hopeful the truth would come out, but was “scared to death” it wouldn’t. She talked about how hard it was to see her daughter testify against her.
“That was the absolute hardest thing I’ve ever experienced, because my job as a mother is to protect her,” Craft said. “There obviously was no anger towards her. It absolutely broke my heart to see that my daughter had been pretty much indoctrinated to believe things that weren’t true.”
Tonya Craft and misconduct at the trial
Following the Tonya Craft verdict, Craft’s attorney, Demosthenes Lorandos, told The Associated Press that he and Craft’s other attorneys have contacted the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the U.S. attorney’s office about what he called the “fraudulent” behavior of Judge Brian House and also the Catoosa County district attorney’s office during the case.
Local media circus
The Tonya Craft trial commenced April 13. The proceedings are a local media circus. Local TV news programs branded the case with tag lines and logos. Breathless anchors showed up on the screen throughout the whole day with promises of "graphic testimony." The "Tonya Craft Trial" on News Channel 9 and "Tonya Craft: Teacher on Trial" on "WCRB — News you can count on," competed for ratings and site hits with constant updates on all the sordid details.
Tonya Craft and conspiracy against her by Prosecutor?
Many of the players within the Tonya Craft trial showed questionable behavior that suggested Judicial misconduct. As outlined by Cato-at-liberty.org, the judge sitting on the case represented the defendant's husband in their divorce. Defense attorneys asked the judge to step down but he refused. Blogger William Anderson has been covering the trial and reports that with the trial pending, the prosecutor, Len Gregor, wrote status updates on Facebook that involved comments by witnesses. After the Tonya Craft verdict, Anderson wrote to the defendant:
What was done to you was criminal: no other word will suffice. Indeed, if you would like to know where the REAL conspiracy was centered, it was in that courtroom, as a judge and his two henchmen conspired time and again to deprive you of your civil rights to a fair trial. Let me be more specific. House (the judge), Arnt, and Gregor (the prosecutors) were not guilty of overzealousness or even bad judgment. What they did was much, much worse because they teamed up to keep much of the evidence that would have exonerated you out of the courtroom. They harassed your witnesses and then called your four expert witnesses, who are well-respected in their fields (to put it mildly), “whores” and liars.
Tonya Craft verdict – not guilty on all 22 counts
Tonya Craft was arrested in June 2008 and accused of molesting 3 girls in her home between August 2005 and May 2007. After a five week trial, a jury started debating her case on Monday afternoon. On Tuesday, they found her not guilty of all 22 counts, including child molestation, sexual battery and aggravated child molestation. Craft’s chief attorney, Dr. Demosthenes Lorandos, said on the “Today” show that his client had been receiving death threats, and that is why he hurried her out of the courtroom after the Tonya Craft verdict.
Sources for the article
“Today” show Wednesday morning
http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/37103788/ns/today-today_people/
The Associated Press
http://www.ap.org/
Blogger William Anderson
http://williamlanderson.blogspot.com/search/label/Tonya%20Craft
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