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Former Atlanta educators sentenced to up to seven years in prison
ATLANTA - Six former Atlanta public school educators were ordered on Tuesday to serve between one and seven years in prison in one of the nation's largest test-cheating scandals.
Ten of the 11 educators convicted of racketeering this month in the case were being sentenced on Tuesday.
Superior Court Judge Jerry Baxter gave three of the educators 20-year sentences, ordering that seven years must be served in prison and the rest on probation.
Three more educators received five-year sentences, with two ordered to serve two years in prison and the other to serve one year.
'There were thousands of children that were harmed in this thing,” Baxter said during the hearing, after getting into heated exchanges with attorneys for the defendants. 'This is not a victimless crime that occurred in this city.”
Another convicted educator was ordered to serve six months of weekends in jail and five years of probation, avoiding a potentially harsher punishment by making a sentencing agreement with prosecutors.
Baxter had urged the former educators on Monday to consider plea deals that would limit their prison time in exchange for the defendants taking responsibility for the cheating.
Erasing wrong answers was part of the cheating by the educators, who were under intense pressure to meet test targets, prosecutors said during a nearly six-month trial.
Student achievement helped the former principals, teachers and administrators to secure promotions and cash bonuses.
Cheating was rampant throughout the Atlanta school district in 2009, state investigators found, exposing problems that raised national concerns about high-stakes standardized testing.
A Georgia grand jury in 2013 indicted 35 Atlanta educators, including former school superintendent Beverly Hall, on conspiracy and other charges.
Twelve of the educators ended up going on trial for the charges, and 11 were convicted. Hall died of breast cancer this year.
Sentencing has been delayed until August for one of the 11 guilty educators.
Former Atlanta Public School Dobbs Elementary principal Dana Evans asks for leniency during sentencing of racketeering charges in one of the largest U.S. test-cheating scandals in Atlanta, Georgia April 13, 2015. The educators were accused of erasing incorrect answers or instructing students to change their answers to secure promotions and cash bonuses in 2009. (REUTERS/Kent D. Johnson/Pool)
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