Coast principal calls video of disabled girl’s assault child abuse at ex-bus driver’s trial
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Thomas Pearce stormed out of a courtroom Tuesday when a jury watched video footage of former St. Martin Middle School school bus driver Antioinette Jane Raymond shouting at and threatening his special needs granddaughter on a school bus.
He stayed long enough to hear the girl, then 14 years old, cry out for him and her great-grandmother, only to be told they were no where around to help her.
“The whole thing makes me sick,” Pearce said. “It’s hard to even listen, much less watch.”
Special Prosecutor Stanley Alexander played portions of the video for a jury Tuesday. Raymond is on trial this week on misdemeanor charges of contributing to the delinquency, abuse or neglect of child and simple assault.
If convicted, she’s facing a maximum sentence of up to one year in prison plus fines and court costs.
Raymond showed up for her trial in a wheelchair.
The prosecution’s chief witness was Stephanie Gruich, a former principal at St. Martin Middle School who launched the investigation in 2015 after she got a complaint from a parent who said her child was reluctant to come to school because the “teachers were mean.”
Gruich decided to investigate further and had her transportation secretary pull video footage from the special needs school bus to see if she could find anything there that could explain the child’s fears, she told the jury Tuesday.
What she saw in the tapes included footage of former St. Martin Middle School teacher Kerri Anne Nettles shouting at the girl, stuffing a rag in her mouth to shut her up and threatening her.
In addition, she saw Raymond shouting at the child, threatening her and sitting on top of her, all of which she described as child abuse.
After the reviewing the footage, Gruich said she turned the video over to the Jackson County Sheriff’s Office to investigate. She also recommended the terminations of both Raymond and Nettles.
Defense Attorney Keith Pisarich tried to argue that Raymond never sat on the child, but instead sat beside her when he said she was trying to calm her down.
Pisarich asked the judge for directed verdict, claiming the evidence wasn’t there to convict her on the charges lodged against her.
Krebs denied his request.
Breaking the story
The Sun Herald broke the story last year after obtaining exclusive video footage of the assault at the hands of Raymond and Nettles, a former special education teacher.
In the video, Raymond threatens to send the girl to jail, choke her and kill her if she doesn’t shut up and stop moving around in her seat on the school bus.
“Now, go ahead, move, move,” Raymond shouts. “Can you move now? Huh? You going to shut that mouth, huh?, You going to holler anymore?
“You do it again, I’m going to warn you again. You better shut your mouth. You hear me? You hear me?”
When the student calls out for her Paw Paw and says she wants to go home. Raymond told the girl her family was gone.
Nettles shouts at the girl and twice stuffs a rag down her mouth to shut her up.
However, Nettles’ case has been resolved.
She pleaded no contest to misdemeanor charges, received a suspended prison sentence and a fine.
Nettles did not testify at Tuesday’s trial.
A fight for justice
The girl’s grandfather has been outspoken in his outrage over the misdemeanor charges filed in the case.
“This lady and her accomplice physically abused my special needs granddaughter,” Pearce said. “This lady (Raymond) right here threatened to kill and strangle her.”
Testimony resumes Wednesday in Jackson County Circuit Court.
This story was originally published November 13, 2019 at 5:00 AM.
