Sydney teacher Monica Young’s sex abuse in classroom revealed

A Sydney physical education teacher has broken down while giving evidence in court after admitting she sexually abused a 14-year-old student.

A female physical education teacher dared her 14-year-old student to touch her sexually in a classroom, telling him, “you don’t have the balls”, a court has heard.

Aware of the illegal nature of her actions, the court heard Monica Elizabeth Young told the boy: “It‘s dangerous if we get caught but if you do it, it will be worth it”.

Court documents obtained by The Daily Telegraph outline the sick details of the sexual abuse, which happened on and off school grounds.

After initially denying the child sex allegations, Young changed her tune and pleaded guilty last year to two counts of aggravated sexual assault and one count of intentionally sexually touching a child.

The Greenacre woman was 23 and soon to be married, when she got her first full-time job at a Sydney school teaching teenage boys in March 2020.

She initially groomed the boy, adding him on social media app Snapchat, before physically abusing him just three months after starting the role, in June 2020.

Monica Young arrives for sentencing after pleading guilty to sexually assaulting a male high school student. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Jeremy Piper

The agreed facts reveal they messaged each other for a few days, before Young told the boy to “send one”, referring to a nude picture. He sent a picture of his penis.

A few days later, Young sent a picture of her vagina, breasts and a video of herself touching her nipples.

She then initiated sexual contact, telling the student to meet her in a class during lunch.

Sitting on a desk with him, Young dared the boy to “finger” her, coaxing him by saying: “You don’t have the balls”.

He touched her vagina over her tights, before she took his hand and put two fingers inside her.

During a school week, the boy skipped class to meet Young at a park.

She picked him up and parked her car, before climbing over the centre console to abuse him.

On the last day of the school term, Young sat at the back corner of her classroom with the boy, while the class watched a movie.

Young touched his penis over his clothing. The same day at a different part of the school, she performed oral sex on the boy.

In a Snapchat call on the first weekend of July, 2020, Young appeared to orgasm with a vibrator while the boy watched.

She asked the boy to show his penis, which he did.

Young sent him a selfie in bed captioned: “I’m waiting for you”.

The 24-year-old, wearing a fur coat, dark pants and her hair pulled back in a bun, sobbed profusely while giving evidence for the first time in the District Court on Thursday.

“You started to dare him. Saying you don‘t have the balls, In terms of (initiating) physical contact with you?” Prosecutor Alexander Terracini asked Young.

She responded: “Correct”.

He read a text Young sent to the boy: “It‘s dangerous if we get caught but if you do it will be worth it”.

“This is not spontaneous,” Mr Terracini told the court.

Monica Young was 23 when she began teaching teenage boys. Picture: Supplied

He said the relationship ended when the mother of the victim became aware of the abuse.

Young read an apology letter she wrote to the boy and his family aloud in court.

“I have caused emotional pain to (the victim) and I regret that deeply. I deeply regret that I let the relationship progress as far as it did … the lines became blurred … it was inappropriate and wrong,” Young said in a soft voice in between tears.

“I never went into teaching for this to happen.”

Young told the court she was not trained or qualified to teach in certain subjects but was asked to by the school.

“So I had to go home to teach myself to teach the boys … I was at the same level as them,” she told the court.

She said a month after she started working full time at the school, students were forced to learn from home due to Covid and talk to teachers via email, Zoom and Google Classroom.

Monica Young sobbed profusely while giving evidence for the first time in the District Court on Thursday. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Jeremy Piper

Young’s Barrister Margaret Cunneen SC told the court the boundaries blurred during Covid.

“There weren‘t those boundaries. Students could message you all the way up to midnight. One gets a picture of a young teacher a bit out of her depth,” Ms Cunneen told the court.

“Without being sexist, it would be difficult for a young lady at 23 in her first year of teaching to maintain the proper barriers, the distance and authority over boys in that age group.”

Prosecutor Alexander Terracini asked the court “how on earth” gender was relevant.

“While it may be accepted she didn‘t go into teaching to get to children, in her very first job within months, she was abusing children,” Mr Terracini said.

“How on earth is gender relevant in this? The Crimes Act doesn‘t care. The fact is she is a 23 year-old teacher and she is abusing a 14-year-old. That is why she needs to go to jail.”

Young told the court the five weeks she spent in custody was “confronting and scary”.

And the strict bail conditions she has abided by for 10 months, including curfew and house arrest, affected her mental health.

Young said seeing a psychologist, who said she may have borderline personality disorder, made her reflect on the “foolishness” of her behaviour.

Judge Kate Traill will deliver her sentence on July 8.