California 'teacher of the year' sexually assaulted elementary school boys. She gets 30-year term

A San Diego County educator who as soon as was named trainer of the yr has been sentenced to 30 years to life for grooming and sexually assaulting two younger boys in her elementary faculty classroom in Nationwide Metropolis.

Jacqueline Ma took benefit of her function as a fifth- and sixth-grade trainer at Lincoln Acres Elementary to control her victims, luring them with items, particular consideration and even finishing their homework, based on the San Diego County district legal professional’s workplace.

When certainly one of her victims was not allowed entry to social media or private digital units at house, she went as far as to arrange an unsanctioned after-school program and directed him to message her by way of a college chat utility, prosecutors stated.

The 36-year-old trainer pleaded responsible in February to 2 counts of forcible lewd acts on a toddler, one depend of a lewd act on a toddler, and one depend of possessing little one sexual abuse materials.

She was arrested by the Nationwide Metropolis Police Division in March 2023 after the mom of one of many victims reported inappropriate messages she discovered between her son and Ma on a household pill. Investigators discovered that Ma had groomed the boy for greater than a yr earlier than sexually abusing him when he was 12 years outdated.

Ma carried out sexual acts on the boy in her classroom over a three-month interval, whereas his mother and father thought he was taking part in an after-school basketball program, prosecutors stated.

Investigators additionally found that she had groomed and sexually assaulted a second sufferer, an 11-year-old boy, in 2020.

“This defendant violated the belief she had along with her college students in essentially the most excessive and traumatic manner attainable and her actions are despicable,” Dist. Atty. Summer season Stephan stated in an announcement. “Her victims should take care of a lifetime of unfavorable results and her 30-year sentence is acceptable.”

Ma was named trainer of the yr for the 2022-23 tutorial yr by the San Diego County Workplace of Training. She earned her bachelor’s diploma in biology and grasp’s diploma in training from UC San Diego and had taught fifth and sixth grades within the Nationwide College District since 2013, based on a profile within the San Diego Union-Tribune.

She used her repute as an above-and-beyond educator who was personally invested in her college students’ success to realize the belief of victims’ mother and father, prosecutors stated.

“No little one deserves what this defendant did,” stated Stephan. “I hope this sentence brings a measure of justice to the victims, their households and the group that was left reeling from this defendant’s crimes.”