The conviction of former O.B. Whaley Elementary School principal Lyn Vijayendran was only the second time in two decades that Santa Clara County prosecutors had brought such a misdemeanor charge -- and the first time they'd won.
Vijayendran, 36, dabbed at her eyes with a tissue while the clerk read the guilty verdict.
She later wept when Santa Clara County Superior Court Judge Deborah Ryan took the unusual step of immediately sentencing her. [...]
In the end, the strongest evidence against the principal were her own notes from interviewing the child. The girl told the principal that Chandler blindfolded her in a room with no one else there, made her lie down on the classroom floor, told her to open her legs, touched her feet with something that felt like a tongue, inserted something gooey in her mouth and then wiggled her head around until she tasted a salty liquid. Chandler told Vijayendran that he called the girl into the classroom to prepare a lesson on Helen Keller, which he had been using for years.
What happened to the one who actually committed the act?
ReplyDeleteChandler was subsequently arrested in January and ultimately charged with committing lewd and lascivious acts on five children. Tests by the Santa Clara County crime lab found his semen on a classroom chair. The 35-year-old teacher, in jail pending his trial, faces a maximum sentence of 75 years to life if he is convicted.
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