A judge denied a change of venue request Friday from the Central Florida special education teacher charged with abusing her special needs students.

South Seminole Middle School teacher Kathleen Garrett (pictured, left) was charged with nine counts of child abuse. Witnesses said she pushed an autistic child's face into vomit, punched other special needs students, knocked their teeth out and even choked them.

In one instance, Garrett is accused of rubbing her body against a child and saying, "Cry for mama."

A judge said Friday they will try to find an unbiased jury in Seminole County before addressing the issue of a change of venue, Local 6 News reported.

The biggest issue for the defense was media coverage of Garrett's alleged abuse, Local 6 News reporter Jessica Sanchez said.

Garrett's attorney, Thomas Egan, blasted the media, saying reporters have forever tainted Garrett's image through bias reporting.

"Your honor, if we are going to have to fight through the entire trial and always have this cloud of media coverage and sensational allegations over our heads, the jurors heads, over the witnesses heads, I don't know how we are going to have a fair trial," Egan said.

Egan put on a media professor on the stand Friday who said the media covered the Garrett case in such detail that there is already a presumption of guilt.

The prosecution said Garrett's case has not received any more attention than other high-profile cases.

"There has been no evidence here that pretrial publicity in this case is any different than other cases," prosecutor Donna Scott said. "The press is entitled to be at this trial."

She also pointed out that the media professor was getting paid $150 an hour by the defense to specifically study media coverage of Garrett's case and not others.

The 49-year-old faces five founts of child abuse from 2001 to 2004.

If convicted, Garrett could get 75 years in prison.

Watch Local 6 News for more on this story.