Judge deaf to ex-principal’s leniency plea in sex case
CHILLICOTHE — Jeffrey Fisher, once honored as Ohio’s Principal of the Year, appeared confident Monday that he was going to leave a courtroom with his family, despite a conviction on charges that he had sex with two female students.
Attorneys for Fisher, a former teacher and high school principal for Chillicothe City Schools, had asked for community control, which is essentially probation with no jail time. Ross County Prosecutor Jeff Marks, in keeping with a plea deal, agreed that a prison sentence wasn’t necessary.
But Ross County Common Pleas Judge Michael Ater wasn’t having any of it. Running through a lewd laundry list of Fisher’s behavior, most of it revealed publicly for the first time, he sent the 36-year-old married father of two to prison for two years.
“You abused your position,” Ater told a clearly stunned Fisher during his sentencing hearing on two counts of felony sexual battery. “You turned the school into your own hunting ground.”
Fisher was hired by Chillicothe schools in 2005 as a language-arts teacher. He became high school principal in 2011 and won Ohio Principal of the Year in 2015. In August 2016, as rumors of an investigation swirled, he was moved to an administrative position overseeing enrollment. The district suspended him in November 2017, and he resigned about two months later.
Prosecutors initially charged Fisher with seven counts of sexual battery involving two students, but he took a plea deal in November. He entered an Alford plea, which means he doesn’t admit guilt but concedes prosecutors had enough evidence to convict him, to two of the charges.
After Fisher gave a nearly five-minute speech Monday saying the case involved a misunderstanding because of the “kindness” he and his wife offered students “24/7” over the years, Ater blasted him.
“What strikes me most about this case is ... how long this went on and how you were willing to continue this deception in the face of all the evidence against you,” Ater said. “Even today you will have people believe you were innocent and that your plea is some kind of noble act to save these victims from testifying.”
Ater said the evidence of Fisher’s guilt was overwhelming — that Fisher took photos of his own genitals while at his desk and in the staff bathroom and sent them to the students, and told them he loved them. He said the students described in detail Fisher’s bedroom as well as one in his mother’s home, and that Fisher also had sex with the students on school property.
Defense attorney Brad Koffel said his client is eligible for judicial release in six months. Marks said he would not oppose the request.
The sexual relationships with the two students happened during the 2009-10 and 2011-12 school years. Neither of the students, now adults, was in court. Myers said both agreed with a sentence of community control.
With more than 30 of Fisher’s supporters — including his mother and wife — sitting in court, Koffel had argued that his client’s “reputation has been shattered. His doctoral degree is … worthless. His career in education is permanently destroyed. His earning capacity has been decimated, and his savings have been nearly wiped out.”
Fisher himself spoke mostly about how he will never be an educator again — the conviction means he will be banned, as well as having to register for life as a sex offender — and of how his children need him.
“I’ll never again be an educator. I loved every single day of it, that’s why this hurts so much,” Fisher said. “I beg of you, judge, please don’t take me away from my family for a single night.”
After the sentencing, Fisher was allowed a moment to speak to his wife and then taken from the courtroom without being handcuffed.
Getting the last word of the day, Judge Ater told Fisher that this case shouldn’t be over because the report indicates many people protected him over the years. Longtime Chillicothe Superintendent Jon Saxton, who had been under suspicion about what he knew of Fisher’s conduct and when, left the district with a negotiated settlement last year.
“The only thing from this case that makes me somewhat relieved,” Ater told Fisher, “is that the victims, in spite of you, are thriving.”