A sex ed teacher accused of sexually inappropriate behavior but law does not allow her to be charged

[janterry]

Meaghan Falby was well known and well liked for her up-front and shame-free approach to health and sex education. But in the classroom — and in several private group chats she maintained with students — she continually blurred the lines, current and former students told police and VTDigger.

The veteran U-32 Middle & High School educator resigned from her post midway through the year and has now been accused by the Department for Children and Families investigators of sending inappropriate sexual messages to two students.

Things took a turn when he graduated, the former student told police. Falby texted him a picture of her breasts, and while he initially blocked her number, they eventually reconnected earlier this year. She called him one night while he was “hammered,” he told police, and they had phone sex. Per his account, he asked her not to contact him again when they talked the next morning.

and

Falby was eccentric, bubbly, and unfiltered — and besides, her job was to talk about sex and drugs. A joke about clearing a 10-foot bong, an off-color remark about how attractive the new school nurse was, a gift of condoms for one 15-year-old boy’s birthday — it often felt hard to parse what was innocuous and what was inappropriate, they said.

She will not be charged (again, from the article):
“Vermont law does not presently provide for theories of criminal liability where there is no demonstrable attempt to lure a child to engage in a sex act, compel or encourage delinquent acts, or exchange inappropriate images,” Thibault wrote on May 12.

https://vtdigger.org/2021/07/15/u32-sex-ed-teacher/

[marble falls]

1. I think she was trying to be a "friend" as much as a teacher, it obviously went way too far.

[janterry]

2. Do you think she wasn't grooming them?

Here:
Remarking in one chat on Instagram with three male students, that “ya’ll are angry men,” Falby suggested the following: “Go workout – and rub a few out…get that testosterone flowing outward.”

In the same chat, when one boy brought up “good Quality porn,” Falby had these words of advice: “boys boys boys,” she began, “I hate to break the news to you but legitimately most of it needs to be paid for… Happy to buy you some subscriptions when you turn 18. It’s a game changer literally.”

Falby would also frequently bring up school gossip and the teens’ love lives. She called one the “it boy” and bemoaned, jokingly, his interest in a classmate.

“Too bad he’s wasting his time on the young ones,” she wrote, adding a smirking emoji. In another chat, Falby unexpectedly shared an image of a starfish, whose five arms looked like penises.

IMO: She had no boundaries and she clearly shouldn't be a teacher. What I really find amazing is that no one reprimanded her when her behavior went out of lines. There were plenty of warning signs.

She's at fault, clearly as a 'professional'. But the school and the other teachers certainly knew enough about her behavior that they could have alerted the staff. There might have been an intervention.

Once she got to the 'phone sex' - that's really horrific. She called him the next morning.....