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Mom Gets 1 Year For Encouraging School Bus Fight

Crystal L. Lauderdale /Tampa Tribune

Shayla Muldrow looks back at her family in the courtroom after being sentenced to 364 days in jail for encouraging her daughter to fight on a school bus.

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By THOMAS W.  KRAUSE | The Tampa Tribune

Published: September 20, 2007

Video: Mom Handcuffed | Comment

TAMPA - A 26-year-old mother convicted this week of walking onto a school bus and encouraging her daughter to fight another girl was sentenced to a year in the county jail.

Hillsborough County Judge John Conrad told Shayla Muldrow that she crossed a line when she walked onto that bus. A school bus, he said, is the same as a school – a protected place for children.

Prosecutors contend that Muldrow walked onto a school bus with her then-9-year-old daughter and told her to get into a fight with another student. The other girl had slapped Muldrow's daughter earlier in the week.

Muldrow's defense attorney tried to portray her as a mother protecting her daughter from a bully.

"You didn't want her to be affected by a bully," Conrad said. "But I don't know if you asked the question: If I encourage her into this aggressive act, have I now made her the person I wanted to protect her from?"

At the end of the hearing, Conrad left her with one question:

"Do you love your children enough to keep them from repeating your mistakes?" he asked.

The judge handed down the sentence prosecutors had asked for.

Following the jail time, Muldrow must serve six months probation, complete an anger-management class and perform 50 hours of community service. She must also write a letter of apology to the bus driver.

Assistant state attorney Venessa Bornost said Muldrow has had several previous convictions for sentences including marijuana possession, criminal mischief and giving a false name to a law enforcement officer.

In 1996, she was riding in a stolen vehicle that wrecked, killing someone. Eleven years later, Muldrow is still committing crimes, Bornost said to the judge.

"Ms. Muldrow has been in jail for short sentences and has been on probation," Bornost said, "none of which has rehabilitated her away from her criminal ways."

Assistant Public Defender Cordel Batchelor had asked for probation or a suspended sentence. She said Muldrow has a diagnosed mental condition that makes her act impulsively.

On March 2, when Muldrow walked onto that bus, she truly believed she was there to help her daughter, Batchelor said.

"I think every mother's instinct is to protect her child," she said.

In a brief statement to the judge, Muldrow blamed the bus incident on poor judgment.

Muldrow's mother and a therapist spoke on Muldrow's behalf. The therapist said Muldrow broke down in tears at the thought of jail – scared at what would happen to her children while she was incarcerated.

Sabrina Ford, Muldrow's mother, said she hoped her daughter could get help and learn impulse control.

"If she could do that, she could be a complete person," Ford said.

The children, Ford said, are already suffering. Classmates have teased them after seeing Muldrow on television, Ford said.

Conrad said his sentencing decision was not easy because it affects so many people, including Muldrow's mother and children.

On Tuesday afternoon, a jury took an hour and a half to convict Muldrow of trespassing and contributing to the delinquency of a minor. She had faced up to one year in jail on each count.

At trial, defense attorneys tried to portray Muldrow as a concerned mother, trying to keep a classmate from bullying her daughter. The 11-year-old girl, who is not being identified because of her age, had slapped Muldrow's daughter two days earlier.

Prosecutors, however, said Muldrow "ushered" her daughter onto the bus with retaliation as a goal.

Testifying on her own behalf, Muldrow said she was shocked when her daughter came home with a welt on her cheek. The family had just moved to the neighborhood.

Muldrow said she walked her daughter to the bus two days later to ask the bus driver about misconduct on his bus and to escort her daughter to her seat.

The bus driver, she said, was a substitute, so Muldrow took matters into her own hands.

Muldrow acknowledged asking the busload of children who had slapped her daughter. When the 11-year-old raised her hand, Muldrow walked her daughter to the back of the bus.

"Handle it," she could be heard saying on a surveillance video that showed the fight.

Muldrow testified that she wasn't expecting a physical confrontation and only wanted her daughter to tell the other girl to stop bullying her. She acknowledged under cross examination, however, that she took off her daughter's back pack because she didn't want her daughter to wear it during a fight.

Reporter Thomas W. Krause can be reached at (813)259-7698 or tkrause@tampatrib.com.

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