LITTLE ROCK (AR)
Arkansas Times
Posted by Max Brantley on Tue, Sep 17, 2013
David Koon reports from the county courthouse, where Kathy Griffin, a former Mount St. Mary Academy employee, is being retried on a charge of failing to report sexual abuse of a student by a sometime partner, Kathy O’Rourke, who was also a Mount St. Mary teacher.
A jury couldn’t reach a verdict in Griffin’s first trial in January. She insists she didn’t know about O’Rourke’s relationship with the student until after she was no longer a student at Mount St. Mary. Her defense is that she had no legal obligation to report the relationship, though she ultimately did.
O’Rourke testified today that Griffin had suspicions about the relationship. Her testimony was part of a plea deal she reached before pleading guilty to a charge of abusing the teenager. She got a 15-year sentence, with all but 120 days suspended, and was ordered not to have contact with the girl for 15 years, plus fined $5,000. Yesterday, she was sent to jail for violating the terms of her probation by calling the girl from jail 56 times and connecting on 46 of them. She’ll be resentenced next month.
KELLY O’ROURKE: Said Griffin questioned her repeatedly about relationship with teen.
O’Rourke testified today in a prison jump suit. O’Rourke said her relationship with the victim began in the victim’s junior year of high school and lasted until O’Rourke broke it off in January 2012. At the time, O’Rourke was in a relationship and living with Griffin, as she had been “off and on” since 2003,
Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.