• A 27-year-old Auckland teacher was sentenced to two years and one month in prison for grooming and performing sex acts on a 15-year-old student.
• Judge Brooke Gibson emphasised the significant breach of trust and ordered her to be placed on the child sex offender registry.
• The teacher’s request for permanent name suppression was denied, but her name remains suppressed pending appeal.

A formerly “well-regarded” female teacher from Auckland who performed sex acts on a 15-year-old male pupil after grooming him has been sentenced to prison.

The woman, now 27, was an English teacher at a secondary school that cannot be named to protect the identity of the victim.

She sought permanent name suppression while appearing before Judge Brooke Gibson in Auckland District Court today. The request was denied but her name remains suppressed while she considers an appeal.

The woman had sought a community detention sentence, with electronically monitored home detention being an alternative if the judge considered the first option to be too light. But Judge Gibson said neither would do, given clear direction from the Court of Appeal that most cases of her nature require a sentence of imprisonment.

“You are a teacher, and I think that is a significant aggravating factor,” he said, adding that a strong message has to be sent to others in a trusted position such as hers. “Deterrence, denunciation and accountability require a sentence of imprisonment in your case.”

He ordered a term of two years and one month of imprisonment, just shy of the two-year threshold at which a judge is allowed to consider a non-custodial term.

A teacher appears in Auckland District Court for sentencing after admitting illegal sexual activity with a 15-year-old pupil. Photo / Alex Burton

The woman clutched her shoulders and started crying as his decision was announced, telling family sitting in the gallery to support her that she loved them. Her sobs turned into wails that could be heard in the courtroom after she was led by security officers out a side door for placement in a holding cell.

Judge Gibson also ordered her to be put on the child sex offender registry.

Court documents state the woman began exchanging messages with the boy via Snapchat in July 2023, about one month after she started at the school.

“From that point forward, [she] groomed [him],” the agreed summary of facts for the case state. “[She] repeatedly flirted with [the student], commenting on his smile and appearance, buying him vapes and allowing him to use her credit card.”

In September that year, the teacher drove the student to the carpark at Parakai Pools, where she performed sex acts on him. She then dropped him off at his home.

“After this incident, [she] asked [the student] to keep the incident ‘on the lowdown,’” court documents state. “She then began sending nude photographs of her body to him on Snapchat.”

The photos were accompanied by sexually explicit messages.

Two and a half weeks after the first incident, the teacher took the student and a friend of his to the movies, giving the victim two cans of alcohol. She behaved inappropriately during the movie, then dropped off the boy’s friend and took the victim again to the Parakai Pools carpark, where more sexual acts occurred.

The teen did not attend today’s sentencing, but Judge Gibson was handed victim impact statements from him and his mother. They were not read aloud in court, but the judge noted that both were strongly opposed to the woman receiving permanent name suppression.

“The complainant refers to his emotional and mental health having been severely impacted,” the judge said, noting that the victim also reported having lost interest in school since the incidents.

His mother was also, of course, upset that his school was not the safe place it should have been, the judge said, adding that she was “also angry you bought alcohol for him as part of your grooming”.

Defence lawyer Emma Priest pointed out that on the last of the two incidents the boy was five days short of his 16th birthday.

The woman pleaded guilty to a representative charge of sexual conduct with a young person under 16, which is punishable by up to 10 years’ imprisonment. Had the boy been 16, she could not have been charged under that law.

Priest also suggested the power imbalance was less significant between a female teacher and a teen boy, making it less of an aggravating factor because the boy was less vulnerable than if in a case of a female student pursued by an older male. Their age disparity of 10 years also made the case less serious than others in which older teachers were prosecuted, she argued.

The defence lawyer said her client had recently exited a violent relationship, which she suggested had a causative link to her poor decision-making with the boy. She’s since been assessed as being a low risk of reoffending.

Since the incident came to light, she had surrendered her teaching certificate and obtained a new job, Priest told the judge. The defendant offered to pay $50 per week to the boy over the next year for him to use on counselling, but that would only be feasible if she received a non-custodial sentence and continued working, the lawyer said.

Crown prosecutor Emma Kerr opposed the defence’s request for permanent name suppression and to avoid being placed on the sex offender registry. She also disagreed with the defence suggestion that the offending was less significant because of the victim’s gender.

“There was a significant power imbalance evident,” she said. “He was in his teacher’s car with no one else around.”

The judge agreed.

“I think there’s a significant breach of trust,” he said. “You were his teacher.

“He and his parents were entitled to know he was safe from sexual offending when he was in school.”

Craig Kapitan is an Auckland-based journalist covering courts and justice. He joined the Herald in 2021 and has reported on courts since 2002 in three newsrooms in the US and New Zealand.

SEXUAL HARM

Where to get help:
If it's an emergency and you feel that you or someone else is at risk, call 111.
If you've ever experienced sexual assault or abuse and need to talk to someone, contact Safe to Talk confidentially, any time 24/7:
• Call 0800 044 334
• Text 4334
• Email [email protected]
• For more info or to web chat visit safetotalk.nz
Alternatively contact your local police station - click here for a list.
If you have been sexually assaulted, remember it's not your fault.