An employee of Floyd Co. Schools pleads guilty to sexual misconduct decades later

PRESTONSBURG, Ky. (WYMT) – Earlier this year, a Floyd County School District employee indicted on charges of rape and sodomy. On Thursday, he entered a guilty plea on amended charges to the decades-old charges.

John Martin, a district employee, was indicted by a grand jury in March on charges of first-degree rape and first-degree sodomy after he was 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 Floyd County Area Technology Center — said she suffered years of abuse at the hands of Martin, and shared her victim impact statement during Thursday’s sentencing.

“I didn’t have a normal childhood. I was raped and sodomized for two years, in class, during school, with the lights off,” says Absher. “Sir. Martin was my history teacher for two years. He changed my life forever. He changed my whole personality, my whole who I am.”

She said that over those years, Martin asked for “special hugs,” forced her to “perform oral sex on him almost every day,” “took her virginity” and filmed the act to use as blackmail. She said he would continue to sodomize her for years and shared a desire to do the same to other students.

“Now I will live the rest of my life with the psychiatric problems of rape and sodomy that came from being a person of trust and power,” she said. “You stole my self-confidence and destroyed it. So here I am, years later, broken, trying to rebuild what you took from me and making sure it doesn’t happen to anyone else. I felt so small and so dirty when you raped me and I’m still trying to wipe off the trash you put on me.

After sharing her story, Judge Johnny Ray Harris asked Absher to verify that the plea deal reached was the deal she agreed to during mediation. However, she said that after mediation she was told she “had to agree” to amended charges or the case “would be dismissed.”

Harris sought clarification from Assistant Commonwealth’s Attorney Melissa Goodman. She said the “laws are different now” so the misdemeanor charge was brought up with the age of the events in mind because the Commonwealth would not be able to remove the element of coercion from the original rape and sodomy charges. prove. a test setup.

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

“If this had happened today, you would be in state prison for several years,” Harris said.

Absher and her family say they are not happy with the “slap on the summons,” and they wanted to see Martin registered on the sex offender registry. However, Absher hopes the case will shine a spotlight on the reality of sexual abuse in the school system.

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

On Thursday morning, Floyd County School District officials said Martin was still an employee, but they released a statement on the sentencing Thursday afternoon: