Lina Sinha, former principal of a Montessori school in Manhattan, has appealed against her conviction for having sex with an under-age male student, arguing that the prosecutors concealed promises to a witness in exchange for his cooperation.
Sinha said in papers filed Wednesday with the appellate division of State Supreme Court that prosecutors in the Manhattan district attorney's office had bolstered their case against her in the minds of the jury by going an extra mile to find a second victim to testify.The jury was deadlocked on charges that Sinha had sex with a second boy. Sinha's appellate lawyer, Joel B. Rudin, argued in his brief that the witness' credibility was compromised because prosecutors offered to help him get leniency for a probation violation on a drug conviction in exchange for his testimony.
Sinha, 41, was convicted on March 29 of having oral sex with the first boy in a classroom at the school in 1996, when he was 13 and she was 30. She was the principal of the school run by her family.
Sinha was sentenced to up to 14 years in prison.
Source-IANS
SRM /J
