By
Michelle Casady
SAN
ANTONIO — A former San Antonio Independent School District officer who pleaded
no contest to groping six middle school girls during pat-down searches in his private
office was sentenced Monday to a year in Bexar County Jail.
Judge
Maria Teresa Herr had the option of sentencing Walter Scott Nolden III, 33, to
either a year's probation or one year in jail under the terms of a plea
agreement he signed in April for the Class A misdemeanor.
Nolden
was an officer at Page Middle School from January 2010 until April 2012,
according to court files.
Each
girl told a similar story about being called into his office under suspicion of
being high or carrying marijuana. They reported he would “peer down their
shirts” and made some “expose their breasts” during his searches for narcotics.
Another
girl said he “looked at her breasts three different times before releasing her”
and “moved her breast around looking for marijuana.”
During
an interview with police, Nolden said he “never touched in any of my searches.”
“I
made a lot of bad choices but actually doing anything to harm or harass was
never my intention,” he said. “Honestly, police work wasn't my calling. I
always wanted to do something to help people and make an impact, but to be a
police officer you have to be mean and hard and that's not me.”