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Ex-teacher Heather Kennedy charged again in student trysts

Authorities say former Wantagh educator ignored order of protection

BY SOPHIA CHANG | sophia.chang@newsday.com

7:55 PM EDT, July 22, 2008

Heather Kennedy, the former Wantagh high school teacher who pleaded guilty last month to having sex with a 16-year-old student, was arrested again, accused of the same crime.

A former Wantagh high school teacher, already awaiting sentencing for having sex with a 16-year-old student, was charged Tuesday with having another five trysts with the boy since she pleaded guilty to the original charges last month, authorities said.

Heather Kennedy, 25, of Massapequa, was first arrested March26 after the boy, a student of hers at Wantagh High School, confessed to his father that they had sex in his car in the parking lot of Massapequa High School, police said.

"Almost immediately after she walked out of court, she was having contact with the victim by phone and in person," Nassau County District Attorney Kathleen Rice said of Kennedy Tuesday.

Kennedy, who taught math and was also a track coach at the school, pleaded guilty to sexual misconduct June 12 and was out on probation, awaiting sentencing in August, according to Rice's office. She faced up to a year in prison and was going to lose her teaching license after registering as a sex offender, Rice said.

At a June hearing where Kennedy pleaded guilty to sexual misconduct, a judge ordered her not have contact with the victim. The boy was issued an order of protection.

But the district attorney's office received a tip and an investigation revealed the two had sex five more times after June 12, in violation of the boy's order of protection, Rice said.

According to the boy's testimony to investigators, in the past two months the boy sneaked out to have sex with Kennedy twice in Kennedy's grandparents' Bellmore home, twice in a mutual friend's Wantagh home, and once after Kennedy picked up the boy from the Massapequa train station, Rice said.

"At this point, her crime is very clear," Rice said, adding that "she persisted to prey on him, and that is the outrageous aspect of this."

Kennedy was arraigned Tuesday on five counts of third-degree rape, five counts of criminal contempt of a court order, two counts of a criminal sexual act and endangering the welfare of a child.

She faces up to four years in prison on each rape charge. She is being held at Nassau County jail on bail of $104,000 bond or $52,000 cash. She is due back in court tomorrow.

Kennedy said nothing during the arraignment, while assistant district attorney Jamie Johnson argued for remand and called her a "flight risk."

Her lawyer, Joseph Carbone Jr. of Hauppauge, said during the arraignment that Kennedy was not violent and that remanding her was unnecessary.