Floyd Co. Schools employee pleads guilty to sexual abuse decades later

PRESTONSBURG, Ky. (WYMT) – A Floyd County School District employee earlier this year accused on charges of rape and sodomy. He entered guilty pleas Thursday to amended charges related to decades-old allegations.

John Martin, who worked for the district, was indicted by a grand jury in March on first-degree rape and first-degree sodomy after being accused of sexually assaulting a former student between 1995 and 1997.

Shawna Absher, a 17-year-old student at Garth Vocational High School, now known as the Floyd County area Technology Center, shared a victim impact statement during Tuesday’s sentencing, saying she endured years of abuse at the hands of Martin.

“I didn’t have a normal childhood. I was raped and raped for two years in the classroom, at school, with the lights off,” Absher said. “Mr. Martin was my History teacher for two years. It changed my life forever. “It changed my whole personality, my whole who I am.”

During those years, she said, Martin demanded “special cuddles,” forced her to perform oral sex “almost every day,” “took her virginity” and filmed the act to use as blackmail. She said he continued to rape her for years and shared his desire to do the same to other students.

“I will now live the rest of my life with psychiatric problems such as rape and sodomy caused by a powerful person,” he said. “You stole my self-respect and destroyed it. Here I am, years later, broken, trying to rebuild what they took from me, and to make sure this never happens to anyone else. I felt so small and so dirty when you raped me, and I’m still trying to wash off the garbage you threw at me.

After sharing his story, Judge Johnny Ray Harris asked Absher to confirm that the plea agreement reached was the one he agreed to during mediation. But he said he was told after mediation that he “must agree” to the charges being changed or the case would be “dismissed.”

Harris sought clarification from Assistant Commonwealth’s Attorney Melissa Goodman. “The laws are different now,” he said, and so the misdemeanor charge was brought to the table considering the age of the events because the state would not be able to prove the forcible compulsion element of the original charges or rape and sodomy. a testing environment.

Martin accepted a plea deal, pleading guilty to sexual misconduct, and was sentenced to 12 months probation and no contact with Absher or any minor for 24 months.

“If this happened today, you’d be spending several years in state prison,” Harris said.

Absher and his family said they were unhappy with the “slap on the wrist” and wanted Martin to be registered on the sex offenders register. But Absher hopes the case will bring to light the truth about sexual abuse in the school system.

“I hope God can forgive you because I can’t,” Absher said.

As of Thursday morning, the Floyd County School District said Martin was still an employee and told WYMT a statement would be coming soon.

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