Teacher Gets Probation in Child Abuse Case

(Sanford, Florida) Last January, a 50-year-old teacher of disabled children for Seminole Public Schools, Kathleen Garrett, was found guilty of child abuse for being physically heavy-handed with the disabled boys and girls, occasionally causing injury.

Today, Circuit Judge Clayton Simmons sentenced Garrett to three years probation.

The judge today said there was no evidence Garrett ever abused anyone -- child or adult -- outside her classroom.

Her Florida teaching certificate is no longer valid, and the judge forbid her to apply for a new one.

She has no prior criminal record, the judge said, is not a hardened criminal, and so, he opted to withhold adjudication, meaning that although a jury found her guilty of a felony, he did not formally declare her one.

That means she will not lose her voting rights or suffer any other consequences for having been convicted of a felony.

Before her trial began, Garrett rejected a plea deal that would have placed her on probation for five years.

Okay.