Wednesday, February 22, 2012

Alleged Victims - California Teacher Pleads Not Guilty In Student Bondage Case

Defense attorney asks simply no hurry to judgment

Mark Berndt, 61, shows up with court unshaven as well as silent

He shed his / her employment around January 2011, after that appeared to be rotting in jail one full year later

Police state his / her DNA matches semen observed on spoons throughout his classroom

Los Angeles (CNN) A ex - lower California schoolteacher typed in a certainly not disloyal plea Tuesday to be able to allegations he or she chained younger students, and then photographed these folks together with semen-filled spoons presented at their particular mouths along with three-inch cockroaches crawling around their particular faces, between other graphic depictions.

Authorities have stated they've identified about 600 shots allegedly consumed by Mark Berndt, 61, inside his classroom.

Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Marcelita Haynes set the next listening to pertaining to March 28.

Berndt's law firm is definitely asking to discover each of the shots seized by investigators, however the center attorney's company features only offered the pup copies with two hundred pics on the 23 alleged patients who've also been identified. The judge will contemplate if the outstanding photos, which includes those the place that the youngsters haven't been identified, are going to be given on the defense.

Berndt, donning an lemon prison jumpsuit, spoke solely once throughout the short hearing, indicating "not guilty."

The defense complained on the judge that Berndt had not been authorized to shave just before his the courtroom appearance.

"They are actively depriving him of your occasion so he appearance unkempt," in lieu of being a professional educator, his / her law firm said.

Victor Acevedoalso complained this jailers include discovered Berndt growing up molester around the jail's phone speaker system.

"We cannot have sheriff's office deputies actor ordinary means in order to effectively put a bull's-eye on his head," Acevedo instructed reporters after the hearing.

The sheriff directed an interior extramarital affairs research belonging to the complaint Tuesday, sheriff's spokesman Steve Whitmore said. Jail supervisors said these people were unaware from the incident, Whitmore said.

Berndt's court-appointed legal practitioner pleaded by using journalists outside the house courtroom to help "not to killer that well" against Berndt while in the intellects of probable jurors with their reporting. He reminded these belonging to the Duke lacrosse rape circumstance where three players were charged involving sexually assaulting an spectacular dancer from some sort of March 14, 2006, party.

"Everybody appeared to be essentially disloyal from the advertising as well as in the incredibly end, when everything has been observed out, some people ignored every one of the costs next to every one of your lacrosse players," Acevedo said.

He vowed which they could bracket some sort of "very energetic defense" of the first sort teacher.

Attorney Gloria Allred, recognised for taking high-profile, suspect cases, what food was in court docket to help observe. She explained your woman was just lately employed by way of parents associated with a single connected with Berndt's alleged victims .

Dismissed with the Los Angeles Unified School District education snowboard related to a year ago, Berndt had been in jail January 30. He made an appearance around courtroom a pair of times later, after which your dog seemed to be ordered used on $23 zillion bail $1 million for each of the 23 is important associated with lewd acts for a child of which your dog faces.

All of these original twenty three persons were in between several in addition to 10 years old, as well as all but a couple of these ended up girls, the Los Angeles County District Attorney's Office said.

Since Berndt's primary appearance, Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department spokesman Sgt. Dan Scott explained a different 200 photographs purportedly taken through the longtime Miramonte Elementary School trainer had been found.

It can be uncertain what, whenever any, extra charges Berndt may deal with as a result of the discovery or alternative innovations in the investigation.

The law enforcement probe initiated when researchers found "over 40 photographs depicting young children in a very college classroom, making use of their eyes blindfolded in addition to jaws protected having tape," a Los Angeles County sheriff's report said.

"Investigators figured out that a lot of the shots depicted suspicious Mark Berndt along with his provide round the children, as well as together with his hand about their mouths," in accordance with that sheriff's department.

Some photos showed "children along with significant dwell Madagascar-type cockroaches about their faces as well as mouths." Others indicate female students together with "what appeared to be a new blue naff spoon, full of a great not known clear/white fresh substance, approximately his or her mouths as when they were visiting take in that substance," stated your sheriff's department.

Scott said which Berndt was in jail immediately after testing center diagnostic tests matched Berndt's DNA that has a product afterwards determined to become semen at a glowing blue plastic spoon and also an clear container coming from a waste bin with his classroom.

The youthful pupils "didn't understand they were victimized," said the sheriff's division spokesman.

"They idea these were becoming blindfolded and also gagged as being a game," Scott added. "And these were rewarded by using cookies or perhaps spoons brimming with sugar, (but) they wouldn't know the spoon included semen."

A lookup connected with Berndt's home observed many hundreds photographs depicting children plus a video clip exhibiting sexual "bondage" activity that "mirrored that bondage-type photos on the children," researchers said.

Parent Bessy Garcia, the mother with two young children who seem to were being amid Berndt's alleged victims , chatted of betrayal.

"He wasn't simply a teacher, he was some of our personal friend," the girl told CNN previous the following month. "He taken to the cleaners us. We considered he had been the top particular person in that world."

Los Angeles School Superintendent John Deasy said in which Berndt was stripped away from his coaching occupation in January 2011, after college officials mastered of the police investigation.

A instructor pertaining to 30 years, Berndt primarily challenged the actual school district's decision to dismiss him. But he gradually fell his appeal and resigned last spring.

His public arrest this specific January precipitated a broader fallout, in to the adequacy associated with safeguards to the school's scholars as well as potential of far more victims.

Days once Berndt seemed to be ingested into custody, yet another Miramonte Elementary teacher Martin Springer, 49 appeared to be imprisoned and costed together with three prison counts of lewd operates having a lady underneath that age group involving 14. He includes pleaded not really guilty.

The school mother board consequently turn Miramonte lower for two days, for the duration of that the aboard reconstituted the complete staff around the 1,400-student school. Miramonte can be positioned in unincorporated Los Angeles County within the Florence-Firestone area, with regards to half a dozen miles southwest regarding downtown Los Angeles.

CNN's Casey Wian contributed to that report.

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