NASHUA, N.H. (AP) – The judge in the trial of a Massachusetts high school teacher accused of sexually assaulting three young women dismissed most of the charges Tuesday – a day after two of the women recanted their testimony.
The judge ruled that prosecutors hadn’t produced enough evidence for the jury to consider the charges that were dropped, The Telegraph reported.
Severine Wamala, 46, who lives in Nashua and taught at Lowell High School, has been jailed since his arrest last year, when the three women told police that he had sexually assaulted them. The women all knew Wamala, but were not students.
Wamala has been on trial facing 22 counts of sexual assault charges, including rape. The two women who recanted testified Monday that police pressured them into making false accusations.
The third woman, a 16-year-old, testified that Wamala had sex with her at least once a month during an 11-month span in 2005 and 2006. Jurors still must consider aggravated felonious sexual assault charges involving the 16-year-old, and one lesser felony sexual assault charge involving a 19-year-old woman, Hillsborough County Superior Court Judge Robert Lynn ruled.
Wamala testified Tuesday that it makes him sick to his stomach to think that anyone would believe he sexually assaulted the women.
One of the women who recanted testified she told lies because the police put her through “emotional torture.”
“I got sick for three weeks,” she testified Monday. “I couldn’t remember what I said. I just shut down.”
Wamala is a native of Uganda who became a U.S. citizen after immigrating in 1988 to get his doctorate at the University of Massachusetts in Lowell.
, was suspended from his job as head of the math department at Lowell High School after his arrest. Wamala also advised the school’s chess club and organized chess tournaments in New England.
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Information from: The Telegraph, www.nashuatelegraph.com
Information from: The Lowell Sun, http://www.lowellsun.com/
AP-ES-09-11-07 1843EDT
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