Teacher, attorneys maintain innocence after arrest on child cruelty
Kimberly Malone (Courtesy: Catoosa County Sheriff’s Office)
FORT OGLETHORPE. Ga. (WDEF)- A Catoosa County teacher is facing charges after an alleged incident last week.
The Catoosa County Sheriff’s Office says that Kimberly Malone, a teacher at Lakeview-Fort Oglethorpe High School, has been charged with one count of cruelty to children.
They did not provide further updates on their investigation, as it is ongoing, but we did learn more from Malone’s attorneys, Tonya Craft and Scott King.
Craft said, “So I got a call on Saturday from a teacher that was very upset, was very confused. Really didn’t know what was going on.”
Craft is a former Kindergarten teacher herself who went through an ordeal after being charged with counts of molestation in 2008, but was acquitted on those charges two years later.
She has since become an attorney to help other teachers who have cases brought against them, and believes in this case, Malone was doing her job.
King said, “From everything we can determine early on, and it is early on we are still investigating ourselves. The student was trying to get to a place that she was not allowed, to leave campus. The teacher did what she was instructed to do, and now the teacher has been suspended, and arrested.”
They also say that the detective in the case has not interviewed the student who is making the allegations against Malone.
“There were other teachers standing right there who to my knowledge have not spoken with the investigator before making a decision to arrest. We certainly know he didn’t give our client, whether she would have or wouldn’t have is a different question, but he certainly told us that it doesn’t matter what she says, she’s getting arrested,” said King.
They say the other teachers that witnessed the incident are vouching for Malone.
Craft said, “We have been contacted by dozens and dozens and dozens of supporters that are friends, there are teachers alongside this individual. That have been former students. So we are taking in all of this information and taking it as it is.”
She hopes fighting cases like this will give teachers a fairer shot in these cases.
“I feel like that years and years and years ago, the teacher was always believed, and now instead of being in the middle that the pendulum has swung the other way and no matter what is said by a student it’s believed. I believe these allegations need to be looked into but I think you need to take a step back and look into them thoroughly because once that arrest takes place, that toothpaste doesn’t get back into the bottle,” said Craft.
Malone has bonded out of the Catoosa County Jail.
Craft says she is on administrative leave with pay, but her tenure has been put on hold pending this case.
