Laurel Woman Found Not Guilty of Choking Students

Jurors were told to determine only one fact on the last day of the criminal trial of former Greencastle Elementary first-grade teacher Susan Burke: Did she choke four of her students while they were in her care?

After a one and a half-hour deliberation, the 12-person jury declared Burke, 36, of Laurel, innocent of second-degree assault.

Last January, Burke was charged with two counts of second-degree child abuse and 10 counts of second-degree assault after eight students told police that she had choked them at least once. The final charge count was down to seven by the last day of the trial, after Judge Ronald Rubin set aside both child abuse charges. Those charges will be tried in a different case at a later date.

This left jurors with the testimonies of four boys in Burke’s class. The boys all said that Burke choked them, some said in reaction to bad behavior, like talking, drawing on the carpet or kicking a ball at a portable classroom. The boys witnessed each other being choked, they said, and described some of the alleged abuses against their peers.

Burke’s attorney, Todd K. Mohink, said the young men were not to be believed because the dates, times and manner of the abuses they described varied. He said their stories may have passed from student to student like a game of telephone. Mohink said that one of the boys admitted to getting in trouble for lying.

Prosecutors said details, especially specific dates, were not as important when asked to believe very young children. Children, prosecutor Karla Smith said, relay details differently than adults.

“Children make the perfect victims,” said Smith in a closing argument. “They make the perfect victims because adults don’t believe them.”

Earlier in the week, jurors heard from some of Burke’s co-workers, including the acting principal of the school, Arienne Clark Harrison, who said she had “concerns about her truthfulness.” Harrison said that she told Burke twice not to have inappropriate contact with students, once in September 2010 and again in October 2010.

Burke testified herself and said that she did touch her students, but not inappropriately. She said that she did role play with her students to show them how to behave.

WTOP reports that she told jurors that she would pretend to be a misbehaving student. She testified that she grabbed a student around the neck during role play.

"Yes. Of course,” Burke told jurors. “I have to totally role play, otherwise it's pointless."

Burke said that she disciplined her students by asking them to put their heads on their desk, not by choking them.

Two paraprofessionals, teachers who spent about six hours in the classroom with Burke each week, testified for the defense that all of her disciplinary actions were appropriate.

Mohink told jurors that there was no evidence of physical markings on the children.

“What it all comes down to is credibility,” Ryan Wechsler, one of the prosecutors, asked jurors. “Who do you believe?”

Burke was found not guilty of all seven counts of second-degree assault.

In response to the verdict, Mohink said, “[I think] jurors listened to evidence and decided properly; justice was served.”