The former Chickamauga kindergarten teacher, who was found not guilty of 22 counts of molestation last month in Catoosa County Superior Court, filed a $25 million suit against 15 defendants including her ex-husband, the Catoosa County Sheriff’s Department, Catoosa County and two child advocacy groups. The suit was filed on May 24, just 13 days after the completion of Craft’s trial.
Earlier this month Craft’s ex-husband Joel Henke, his wife Sarah and Laurie Evans, a therapist brought in by the Lookout Mountain Judicial Circuit to investigate Craft, all filed motions to dismiss the lawsuits against them.
However, the motions filed by Craft in U.S. District Court in Rome claim that suit must be upheld.
According to the motions filed this week:
Craft has spent the last two years of her life defending herself against “patently false charges of child molestation, including baseless allegations that she molested her own daughter.”
She contends in the new motions that she had her children taken away, her reputation destroyed and her career ruined while fighting the “absurd and ridiculous charges.”
Craft alleges in the initial law suit that her constitutional rights to due process were violated when she was arrested and held without probable cause. The suit also claims defamation of character and intentional emotional distress.
“Had anyone conducted a minimal investigation a reasonable person would have seen that the allegations were meritless,” the new motion states.
The Henkes argue that contrary to Craft’s initial suit, they were not owed no duty to Craft and did not violate any laws. Craft claims in this weeks motions that Henke violated the terms of Craft and Joel Henke’s divorce decree which stated he would not do anything to cause an alienation of affection between Craft and their two children.
The new motion also alleges that Joel and Sarah Henke were driving forces in the case against Craft by “lying to investigators and committing perjury on the stand… all while using their children as unwitting pawns.”
The Henkes claim, according to their motions for dismissal, that Craft’s claim fails are unclear, and they cannot file a responsive pleading.
“The defendant seems to believe that because this is a complex case, with many defendants, he is somehow absolved of sorting through a lawsuit of his own making,” the new motion claims.
Evans, Craft claims, put the children through extensive therapy sessions with the intent of implanting false memories and manipulating the children’s testimony trial.
The motion for dismissal filed by Evans simply states that she did not receive a professional affidavit, leaving Craft’s suit against her null. But Craft’s attorneys claim no such document is needed to move forward.
The suit claims that Evans had a documented history of mental illness and ignored evidence that would have cleared Craft of all charges.
Read more: CatWalkChatt – Tonya Craft files new motions in 25 million lawsuit
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