Former Canberra student teacher avoids jail after being found guilty of sexual offences against teenage boy

ABC NEWS (Australia)

A former student teacher convicted of sexual offences against a 15-year-old boy has been spared jail. Petra Shasha first met the boy on a teaching prac at Canberra's St Edmund's College. Shasha was fined $1,000 and has been ordered to undertake counselling during her intensive corrections order.

Transcript

00:00No jail. Petra Shasha was visibly relieved today, as she was finally sentenced in the

00:07ACT Supreme Court. She was found guilty of grooming, sending pornography to a person

00:13under 16 and an act of indecency last year. The pair initially met at St Edmunds College

00:21when Shasha was on a teaching prac. Today, Justice John Burns found nothing untoward

00:26happened until later when the pair met by chance at a sporting event. The boy told Shasha

00:33he was 16. The court heard she gave him lifts to school and elsewhere, bought him clothes

00:39and gave him money. Shasha also sent pornographic images at his request, not realising until

00:46later he was only 15. I accept that he was assertive and persistent in his request for

00:52sexual photographs from you, as well as requests to give him lifts. But he was an immature

00:58teenager and you did not take reasonable steps to determine his age. But Justice Burns said

01:05it wasn't a typical grooming case. What is conspicuously absent is any request for

01:12sexual favours from you to him. Justice Burns said he was satisfied there was little prospect

01:19that Shasha would ever re-offend. He's ordered her to undertake counselling while serving

01:25one year and 11 months on an intensive corrections order. Shasha has also been fined $1,000.

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