Rochelle Cressman, a 32-year-old former gym teacher in Pennsylvania, has been arrested and charged for allegedly sexually assaulting a 14-year-old male student.
According to Pennsylvania authorities, the 32-year-old allegedly had sex with the underage teenage student “at least” 10 times.
Specifically, investigators believe that Cressman had sexual contact with the unidentified teen “at least 10 times” from September 2018 and to April 2019.
Following her arrest, Cressman was taken to the Crawford County Jail and officially charged with multiple charges, including 10 counts of statutory sexual assault, 10 counts of involuntary deviant sexual intercourse and 42 counts of indecent assault of a person less than 16-years-old.
The Titusville Area School District’s superintendent — who confirmed that Cressman began working in the district as a health and physical education teacher in 2009 — said that the district is cooperating fully with authorities’ investigation.
The superintendent said the school district is cooperating fully with investigation.
Cressman is just one of many education officials to be arrested and charged for inappropriate contact with an underage student in recent years.
Since the beginning of 2019 alone, a handful of teachers have been arrested on similar charges, including Beulah High School teacher Kelsie Schmidt in North Dakota, Rancocas Valley Regional High School teacher Alexandra Reiner in New Jersey, and 50-year-old Florida substitute teacher Angela Jean Stanton in Florida. Additionally, Texas teachers Meredith Null and Edna Longoria were arrested on similar charges.
As for why the number of these incidents has seemingly increased, studies suggest that smartphones are the primary reason for the spike in illicit relationships, as it allows teachers to communicate with the minors without supervision.
According to a report from the Texas Education Association, smartphones make easy for teachers to privately text and talk with students and also make it possible for teachers and students to share explicit images.
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