Teacher who sexually abused 15-year-old boy unmasked
Petra Shasha, 28, was found guilty of sexually abusing, grooming and indecently assaulting the schoolboy who believed she was his girlfriend.
A teacher found guilty of sexually abusing a 15-year-old boy after they met at his school has been unmasked.
Petra Shasha, 28, started a relationship with the teenager after doing a placement at his school, St Edmund’s College, in Canberra.
Until this week her name had been suppressed in court but reporting restrictions were lifted this week because the judge said there was no way to identify the boy involved.
Shasha was found guilty of four charges by a jury at the ACT Supreme Court last week.
They included persistent sexual abuse of a child, supplying pornographic material to a young person, grooming and committing an act of indecency on a child.
She was however found not guilty on charges of separate grooming and committing an act of indecency on a child. She denied she had ever had sex with the boy.
The court heard how she first saw the boy, who she never taught directly, when he pressed his face up against her classroom.
She was 24 at the time.
Shasha spent time with him and his friends at break time and when her placement was over she told the court that more than 20 boys from the school had sent her friend requests on Instagram.
She ignored them but the victim persisted and even called her on Instagram.
They started communicating regularly while she worked at nearby Canberra Girls Grammar School.
The grooming charges related to money, clothes, alcohol and vapes that Shasha bought the boy.
She also gave him lifts to school, the ABC reports.
One of the charges of sexual assault related to an incident in a David Jones changing room.
The boy initially told Shasha that he was 16, the legal age of consent, but she later found out that he was 15.
The boy believed he was in a relationship with Shasha and when the police investigation began he told his parents that he didn’t know how he would live without her.
The court heard that when they were out together they had a plan of what to do if they saw anyone they knew, but they never did.
Shasha was caught after St Edmund’s reported the matter to police and officers monitored conversations between the pair.
Shasha will be sentenced in February.