Mother faces 22 boy-sex charges
The Age, Australia, By Selma Milovanovic, December 4, 2004
A female integration aide at a Victorian school has been charged with sexual offences against a boy in her care aged under 16.
The woman, 36, an integration aide at a government secondary school on the Mornington Peninsula, worked with the boy, who suffers from language difficulties, three days a week.
The student is not intellectually disabled.
Most of the offences are believed to have happened at the boy's home. The woman is believed to have lived with the student and his family for some time this year while going through a traumatic separation. The alleged sexual affair took place over eight months.
The teenager is believed to have recently confessed the details to his parents.
The school was notified on Monday and the aide, who cannot be named for legal reasons, was immediately removed from the school. She was charged on Wednesday.
The aide is a mother and several of her children attend the same school.
The woman has been charged with 22 sex-related offences, including sexual penetration of a child aged under 16, allegedly committed between February and September this year.
The Age believes the woman passed a routine police check a year ago. She does not have a criminal record.
An Education Department spokesman said it was inappropriate to comment on the details of the case as it was now a police matter. He said the school had followed all correct procedures.
"The school principal has fired her and she will not be in a Victorian classroom again," the spokesman said.
The woman, who was bailed after being charged, will appear in the Melbourne Magistrates Court on Monday.
