Child Endured Years of Beating, Strangling Before Telling Teacher — Mom Sentenced to 40 Years

A woman from Georgia was sentenced to prison after the child told an elementary school teacher how the mother physically abused the child by beating their legs and choking them, according to the prosecutor. The child was also repeatedly flogged with a belt on the forehead, the prosecutor added.

A 35-year-old woman from Georgia, identified as Candice McClure, was sentenced to 40 years in prison after a jury found her guilty of aggravated assault and cruelty to children, following a four-day trial, according to the Cherokee County District Attorney’s Office.

According to a statement released by the District Attorney’s Office on April 3rd, McClure has been abusing the same child for nearly 10 years. This was not the first time McClure had been arrested; previously, she had been arrested in 2016 on child abuse charges.

The Cherokee County District Attorney, Susan K. Treadaway, mentioned in a statement that “the school teachers were heroes in this case,” while talking about the case, as mentioned in the accused's prison sentence. The District Attorney Treadaway said, according to the prison sentence, that “the teachers recognized the signs of abuse and created a safe space for the child to come forward.”

McClure’s conviction stemmed from a report the child gave to a teacher at an elementary school in 2023. A Child Services Investigator ultimately uncovered the abuse.

“A Cherokee County Elementary School teacher reported child abuse concerns involving a student in her class,” according to the DA’s office. “The student had disclosed to the teacher that McClure had kicked and punched the child’s legs and choked the child with her hands. The teacher’s report prompted the division of Family and Child Services and the Canton Police Department to open a child abuse case investigation involving McClure,” according to the District Attorney’s Office.

After the investigation was launched, the Child Services investigators launched a surprise visit, during which the DFCS photographed bruising on the child’s leg and a “patterned injury of the child’s forehead.”

“The child was transferred to Children’s Healthcare Atlanta, where the medical observers documented significant bruising on the legs, as well as a patterned injury on the forehead consistent with being struck by a belt,” the District Attorney’s office explained.

Later, the child had participated in a forensic interview where the child provided more information. “The family was new to Cherokee County, and we believe the abuse had been ongoing before the family arrived,” the DA’s office said.

While speaking during McClure’s sentencing, Tradeaway described the child’s trauma and abuse as “heartbreaking” in her sentence announcing McClure’s sentence.

“Instead of protecting her own child, the defendant repeatedly inflicted abuse that caused lasting harm,” Treadaway said in her statement. “This conviction and sentence sends a clear message that Cherokee County will not tolerate the abuse of children and will hold abusers accountable to the fullest extent of the law,” Treadaway said.