Atlantic City’s mayor, already accused of abusing his teenage daughter, now faces a new charge that he asked her to lie about how she sustained a head injury.
Marty Small Sr., 50, was charged Monday with witness tampering involving the girl, whom he and his wife, La’Quetta — the New Jersey seaside gambling resort city’s superintendent of schools — were previously charged with assaulting and abusing.
The Atlantic County Prosecutor’s Office said Marty Small, a Democrat, asked his daughter to “twist up” a statement she had given to investigators regarding his alleged abuse of her on occasions in December and January.
Specifically, the mayor is accused of asking his daughter to falsely say that a head injury occurred when she tripped and fell in her room.
Small’s lawyer, Edwin Jacobs, called the latest charge “sheer nonsense,” adding that Small asked his daughter to tell the truth about what happened.
“When a parent encourages a child to be accurate and truthful in statements to investigators, that parent is not witness tampering,” he said Wednesday. “That parent is doing what a good, responsible parent should do. And that is precisely what Marty Small has done.”
Jacobs called the charge “one more effort by the prosecuting authority to second-guess my client’s parenting and corrupt his relationship with his daughter.”
The attorney did not say whether the teen is still living at home with her parents. As recently as last month, Small said she was doing so.