Teacher's molestation trial splits GA community

For a month, the people of two tiny Georgia communities have been consumed with one name: Tonya Craft.

The 37-year-old former kindergarten teacher is on trial on charges she molested three young girls at her house, including some whom had been in Craft's class and were friends with her daughter. Inside the small red-brick courthouse in Catoosa County - once the site of a Confederate hospital during the Civil War - dozens of witnesses have given hours of testimony in front of a packed courtroom.

Many who didn't attend the trial followed it on Twitter and Facebook.

"Everyone has their own idea," said Nasleh Khan, who owns the Courthouse Grill and Cafe across the street from where the trial has lasted four weeks so far. "This is your teacher, and you hope your teacher is trustworthy. You leave your child with her."

Some residents following the case side with Craft and call the trial a witch hunt, while others insist she's guilty.

Defense attorneys have called into question the fairness of a trial in front of Catoosa County Superior Court Judge Brian House, who helped represent Craft's ex-husband in the couple's divorce in the 1990s. The lawyers filed a motion in February seeking the judge's recusal, though he has refused to step down. The documents show that House also was an attorney in a law firm with Craft's former brother-in-law.

Prosecutor Chris Arnt also raised eyebrows when he posted on his Facebook page in January that Craft's defense lawyers "are really insane or just trying to jack up her defense bill," the Chattanooga Times Free Press reported.

House has issued a gag order preventing anyone involved in the case - including the parents of the accusers, attorneys and all witnesses - from commenting publicly.

"It's a small town being exposed. It's very political," said Jenifer Templeton, 36, whose son was in Craft's class the year she was arrested and who lived next door to Craft before the teacher lost her house. "She's being railroaded, that's all there is to it."

On the stand, parents of the girls - who are now 8 and 9 years old - gave tearful testimony about their daughters telling them they'd been molested by Craft.

"I was shocked, in total shock. That was the furthest thing ever on my mind. I never thought that was what she was going to say to me," one mother said during testimony April 19.

Her name is not being disclosed to protect the identity of her daughter. The Associated Press generally does not identify alleged victims of sexual assault.

Craft is charged with 22 counts, including 10 counts of child molestation, six counts of aggravated sexual battery and six counts of aggravated child molestation. Since her arrest in May 2008, she lost custody of her daughter, was fired and lost her house in Chickamauga, Ga., near the elementary school where she taught.

Both Chickamauga and Ringgold, where Craft is on trial, have populations of about 3,000.

The case largely rests with whether the jury will believe the girls or Craft. There is little physical evidence, and both sides have presented expert testimony on the ability of young children to separate fact from fiction. Prosecutors argue that, despite the passage of several years and changes to their recollections, the girls are telling the truth.

Craft now lives in Soddy-Daisy, Tenn., about 30 miles north of Ringgold.

Prosecutors say she touched the three girls inappropriately during parties at her house and on other occasions between 2002 and 2008, though exact dates are not known. Prosecutors say Craft would molest the girls at her house during sleepovers for her daughter.

Craft has repeatedly denied the allegations.

"I have been falsely accused," she said during testimony Thursday. "I have not sexually abused any child."

Friends and family of both sides of the case have shown up day after day at the trial, bringing in pillows to help soften the wooden benches in the aging courtroom. Supporters wear yellow clothes to show solidarity and drive cars with stickers that say "Truth for Tonya" on the bumper.

The two sides usually use separate exits in the courtroom, not speaking a word to each other as they enter and leave the building. Supporters of the accusers mostly keep quiet with reporters, not wanting to fan the rumors that have already spread in the town about the families of the three girls.

Lori Knowles, a friend of one of the accusers' families, said she was shocked to hear the accusations against Craft, whom she had been friends with for years before a contentious divorce between the teacher and her ex-husband. She said Craft's defense team has been unfair to the three girls and their families by painting them negatively.

"My rule is to support the kids. It seems they have been lost in the shuffle," said Knowles, who lives in Ooltewah, Tenn. "Any way you look at it, it's gut wrenching."