Teacher: Martin grabbed her arm behind partitions
Teacher: Martin grabbed her arm behind partitions
| Tahquamenon Area Schools Superintendent Rod Martin, right, confers with defense attorney Prentiss Brown Thursday during a break in district court proceedings. (Journal photo by John Pepin) |
By JOHN PEPIN, Journal Munising Bureau
NEWBERRY — Teacher Susan Pann testifed Thursday that she “had to come forward ... to do something for the safety of other people,” in leveling assault charges against Tahquamenon Area Schools Superintendent Rod Martin.
Pann, who has worked in the district for 21 years, said fears that someone else, perhaps a child, would have to suffer an assault at the hands of Martin prompted her to reluctantly report her boss’s alleged behavior earlier this year.
Martin, 53, is accused of assault or assault and battery. His district court trial before an all-male jury of six, with one alternate selected, began Thursday morning.
The alleged assault took place during a break in a highly-contentious teacher contract negotiations session on Jan. 5.
Prosecuting Attorney James Robinson said just prior to the caucus recess, Pann had reportedly announced that Martin had agreed in committee to hire another teacher to help solve a coverage problem in the Hulbert and Curtis schools.
The offer was apparently not made known to other members of the school administration bargaining team prior to Pann’s announcement, allegedly causing Martin to get angry.
Other members of the administration negotiating team reportedly would have resisted the idea of hiring another instructor.
Witnesses said they heard Martin ask Pann if he could speak to her privately for a moment behind some partitions one witness said were roughly about the height of her shoulder.
“When we got behind the dividers, he immediately grabbed me,” Pann said, looking directly at some of the jurors and Robinson at times when she spoke. “As soon as he grabbed me, I could feel the force of his hand on me.”
Pann testified that Martin forcefully grabbed her upper left arm and squeezed, eventually putting his other arm around Pann and pulling her toward him until her breast touched him so he could talk very closely into her face.
Martin allegedly urged Pann to keep quiet and, if given time, he would see that the Curtis school where she teaches would get another teacher.
“I believe he was angry. I believe he was very angry,” Pann said. “I was scared and I don’t scare easily and I was shocked and I was paralyzed.”
Pann said she promised Martin she wouldn’t say anything in an effort to end the conversation.
Robinson said the charge against Martin is based on a key element of intention to hurt, injure or intimidate.
“The touching is not an assault, it’s the intent that goes with it,” he said.
Attorney Prentiss Brown said Martin doesn’t remember touching Pann, but he doesn’t deny it. However, he said there was no intention to hurt Pann.
“What he did not do ever, ever was try to assault her, to cause her any pain whatsoever,” Brown said.
Martin sent an apology note to Pann and asked to meet with her to apologize for her feeling bad in person.
Pann said she couldn’t really talk about the incident with anyone except for making a brief mention to her husband Tom, knowing making the allegation public would rip apart the district.
“I knew what this would do and I didn’t want it,” Pann said. “I struggled.”
Eventually, she spoke to a friend who took pictures of a thumb-printed bruise on Pann’s arm eight days after the incident.
After telling school board President Roy Holcomb about the issue, he testified he told Pann the district could keep the incident from going public, but the board would have to be informed.
“Once I read the policy, I (had) made a promise I didn’t think I could keep,” Holcomb said. “That was an error on my part.”
Holcomb reportedly cautioned Pann about the incident being her word against Martin’s and the district had to “be careful” about a potential lawsuit.
Pann testified that sleepless nights, talking to a counselor, and alleged failure of the school board to act internally to resolve the issue, led her to ultimately contact police. She asked them not to pursue the incident, but she wanted to file the complaint, still waiting for the school district to act.
On March 1, the board hired Tom Watson, former Gladstone schools superintendent, to investigate the allegations from a school perspective.
Watson testified Martin met with him and cooperated fully as part of his investigation, for which Watson interviewed 34 people. The probe is in its final stages.
“I thought Mr. Martin was very forthright and honest,” Watson said.
Holcomb, one of two defense witnesses called Thursday, said Pann told him she didn’t feel threatened or intimidated by Martin.
Former school board member Georgia French testified she watched the conversation between Pann and Martin, except for a “split second” when she looked away and back, and she didn’t see Martin grab Pann.
“I was closest to them than anybody else in the room,” French said. “There wasn’t any indication that there was trouble there to me.”
French said she was far enough away to not be able to hear Martin’s alleged speaking in a forceful voice, just above a whisper.
“He talks with his hands a lot. I did see his hands up, but I didn’t see his hands on her,” French said.
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