Teacher pleads guilty to sexual acts with 14-year-old student
After cultivating a relationship with his student, a married secondary school teacher took her to his home where they engaged in sexual acts.
The 33-year-old man cannot be named to protect the victim's identity.
He pleaded guilty yesterday to two counts of sexual penetration of a minor and one count of sexual exploitation of a child. The student was 14 years old at the time.
The man had taught the girl since she was in Secondary 1 in 2017. She developed feelings for him and they grew close.
In 2018, they started exchanging text messages about school work and confiding in each other about their personal lives.
The man also gave her gifts, such as an iPhone, a $50 note, and a wristwatch by leaving them in his pigeon hole for her.
But he stopped texting the girl in September 2018 because he felt guilty towards his pregnant wife, said Deputy Public Prosecutor Ho Jiayun.
They resumed texting after the victim was absent from school for a while.
The next three months, they exchanged sexually explicit messages and obscene photographs initiated by the man. The victim also confessed her feelings for him.
On Valentine's Day last year, the man texted the girl's mother and asked if he could take her to school for an exam the next day.
CONSPIRED
After school, he took her to his home, where they engaged in sexual acts before he drove her back to school for her mother to pick her up.
During the March school holidays, the man conspired with the girl to lie to her mother that she had a remedial class to attend in school, and he volunteered to pick her up.
The next day, he took the girl to his home, where they engaged in sexual acts again before he sent her back to her mother's workplace.
The case came to light in April last year, when the girl's father noticed that she was using a different phone.
He discovered it had been a gift from the man and found out about their relationship.
He informed the school principal, who lodged a police report.
DPP Ho asked for at least four years and two months' jail, arguing that the man had abused the trust he had and devised opportunities to be alone with the teenager, and had also deceived her parents.
Sentencing has been adjourned to Feb 27.
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