A former Alabama private school teacher accused of having sex with two students is going to prison. According to court papers, at least four of her encounters with the teens occurred in a local cemetery.
On Monday, 31-year-old Charli Jones Parker was sentenced to 12 years in prison after pleading guilty to one charge of having sex with a student under the age of 19, AL.com reports. Parker was arrested in March; a few days later, her husband, Jamie, was taken in on nine counts of the same charge.
At the time of her arrest, Parker was still a gym teacher and head girls’ basketball coach at Pickens Academy in Carrollton. She faced 13 charges and was able to enter a plea deal to bring it down to one charge.
While Parker was sentenced to 12 years in prison, she reportedly will only have to serve three years, followed by a five-year probation. She was ordered not to have any contact with the students, the New York Daily News reported.
Court papers allege that Parker had sex with the male students "at least 11 times" from October 2014 and March 2016. A deposition in the case accused her of "deviant sexual intercourse" and oral sex. Some of the encounters reportedly occurred at Graham Cemetery in Reform, Alabama.
Parker's lawyer pushed for the postponement of the sentencing until after an appeal of Alabama's teacher-student sex law. In early August, a judge in northern Alabama ruled the law unconstitutional — a ruling that led to the dismissal of charges against two employees caught having sex with students. Parker entered her plea on Aug. 15 but did reserve her right to appeal if the constitutionality of her case should be overturned. Her husband's trial is set for Nov. 27.
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