Fiona Austin jailed for stalking teen student

A former high school teacher who bombarded a student with thousands of texts during a years-long stalking ordeal has been jailed.

Former teacher Fiona Austin was jailed for stalking her teenage student Picture: Mark Stewart

An obsessed high school teacher who showed no remorse for stalking and bombarding her teenage student with thousands of messages during a years-long ordeal has been jailed.

Fiona Austin, who worked as an accounting and economics teacher at the now defunct Melbourne Senior Secondary College, screamed “lies” from the court dock as a judge outlined her distressing and at times horrifying treatment of her young male student.

Austin, 53, was found guilty by a jury of three counts of stalking and one count of using a carriage service to harass the student and his mother following a trial in the County Court in February.

The court heard Austin, who was hired to work at the private school in Melbourne’s CBD by infamous fake principal Neil Lennie, blamed her victim and his mother for getting her fired from the job in 2014.

Judge Michael O’Connell on Wednesday asked Austin if she would agree to undertake a community corrections order – meaning she would avoid jail if she agreed to conditions including supervision and mental health treatment.

Austin, who represented herself, refused and was instead sentenced to a maximum sentence of 18 months jail.

The court heard the disturbing campaign, which the former student said continues to haunt him, was sparked after he let Austin borrow his computer hard drive.

Upon returning it, Austin told the boy, who was then 17, she had been unable to sleep and had found his personal journal on the hard drive and read it.

“This event marked the point your attitude towards (him) became more personal, if not emotional,” Judge O’Connell said.

Soon after, Austin began holding the teenager back after class — initially to talk about his subject choice next year, but quickly the topic shifted to personal discussions about “her and him”.

Austin was hired by MSSC principal, Neil Lennie, who was later convicted of fraud. Picture: David Geraghty

The year 11 student was forced to seek protection against his teacher who repeatedly held him back after class, penned poison blog posts and harassed him over social media under fake screen names including one where she adopted the boy’s surname.

In just 14 months, Austin called, texted and emailed the student a total of 4000 times — about nine times a day.

Judge O’Connell labelled the offending as “protracted and unrelenting” and has shown no remorse towards her victims.

“It is abundantly clear that they have suffered enormously from your harassment and stalking behaviour,” Judge O’Connell said.

“Your contempt for the victims and the legal process generally elevates your moral culpability and diminishes … your prospects of rehabilitation,” he said.

The student wrote to the school at the end of 2014 saying he had become so stressed about her intense attention that he was “uneasy” about going to school at all.

“I do not want to continue to have one-on-one conversations with her … in which I feel trapped and that when I ask to leave she prevents me from going by blocking the door or grabbing me,” he wrote.

Austin was told to stay away from the student – an order she refused – and was sacked the following day.

The Herald Sun earlier revealed in its podcast Class Act, the school was dramatically shut down by the government in 2015 over safety concerns.

Following her dismissal, Austin bombarded the mother and son with messages where she claimed “I am the victim in this”.

Austin was arrested in October 2016 where police found 128 web searches on her computer relating to the student, Google street view images of the mother’s house and photographs of the teenager.

She was remanded behind bars for 350 days and did not apply for bail during that time.

Judge O’Connell on Wednesday sentenced Austin to non-parole period of 12 months, meaning with time served she could be eligible for supervised release in just 15 days.

Austin, however, declared in court she would not be applying for parole.

Originally published as Fiona Austin jailed for stalking teen student