A former Halifax-area teacher who invited a 14-year-old male student to have sex with her has been sentenced to 90 days in jail, to be served on weekends, followed by a year’s probation.
Sarah Jane Allt, 38, was a Grade 9 teacher at Five Bridges Junior High School in Hubley. The Halifax Regional School Board suspended her in February 2016 after it received a complaint about inappropriate contact with a teenage boy and fired her at the end of the school year.
Allt pleaded guilty in January 2017 to a summary charge of invitation to sexual touching. The offence was committed between January 2016 and March 2016 in Stillwater Lake, where she and the boy both lived.
Judge Gregory Lenehan accepted a joint sentencing recommendation from lawyers on Friday in Halifax provincial court.
Allt will serve her sentence intermittently at the Central Nova Scotia Correctional Facility in Dartmouth beginning May 18. She must report to the jail each Friday by 7:30 p.m. and will be released the following Monday at 6 a.m.
“The relationship between teacher and student is one of the most important relationships in our society,” Crown attorney Cory Roberts told the court.
Lenehan said it’s a good thing Allt’s conduct was “nipped in the bud” before she had sex with the boy, or she would have received a longer jail sentence.
“This was a serious breach of trust, not just as it relates to this boy but also as it relates to his parents,” Lenehan said.
“All parents should feel comfortable that their sons and daughters when they’re sent off to school will not face any harm and certainly not be subjected to any type of conduct from their teachers that would be unlawful and detrimental — either psychologically, emotionally or physically — to the child.”
The court heard that Allt began texting with the boy and his friends after they obtained her cellphone number in November 2015.
The texts became more frequent in January 2016and developed into exchanges in which Allt expressed her love for the teen
and her interest in having sex with him.
In late January, Allt called the victim’s mother and admitted that her relationship with the boy had gone beyond the boundaries of teacher and student. The mother insisted that Allt stop texting with the boy and cease driving him to and from school.
The boy’s parents then went to school officials, who advised Allt not to have any further contact with the victim outside school and removed her from the classroom on Feb. 2 Despite the warnings, Allt began meeting the boy on a path after he got off the school bus. On one occasion, she told him she still wanted to have sex with him.
“The victim asked the accused whether it was OK if he did not want to have sex with her, and the accused told him it was OK,” an agreed statement of facts says.
“The accused told the victim that she missed him and loved him.”
Allt was arrested March 11, 2016.
Defence lawyer Joel Pink said Allt has never properly grieved the deaths of her mother and sister in a highway crash in 2002.
“I remind the court that there was no physical touching between the victim and my client,” Pink said. “Needless to say, the event has had a major impact on my client’s life.”
Pink said Allt was married with two children at the time of the offence. He said she understood that she was “crossing boundaries” with the boy but said she was at a loss to explain her behaviour because she was not physically attracted to him and didn’t want to have sex with him.
In a presentence report, Allt said she was not getting any attention at home, “got caught up with things and lost control. Things were bad at home. I screwed things up.”
Asked if she wished to address the court Friday, Allt said: “I’m sorry that this all happened.”
The judge said he was satisfied that the mandatory minimum jail sentence and a year’s probation would appropriately address the primary sentencing principles of denunciation and deterrence without losing sight of Allt’s rehabilitation.
“The risk of Ms. Allt ever engaging in this type of behaviour with another vulnerable person is extremely minimal,” Lenehan said. “She has
given up her teaching licence. She’s not going to be placed in a position in the classroom anymore where she is able to foster such a close relationship with a young person.”
He said Allt’s mental health was “a significant factor in her unlawful conduct, but it’s not one that disallowed her from understanding that what she was doing was wrong and that it was criminal.
“Ms. Allt was this boy’s teacher. There’s more than 20 years difference in their ages. He was her student and, at 14 years of age, he was in a very confusing time in his life . . . and was becoming increasingly more aware and curious about sex and his own sexuality.
“It’s vitally important that the adults in (these teens’) lives who are responsible for giving them guidance and direction not cross the boundary that Ms. Allt crossed in this case.”
While on probation, Allt must perform 50 hours of community service. The judge ordered her to have no contact with the boy and his family and remain 50 metres away from Five Bridges Junior High and the boy’s residence, current school and workplace.
Allt, who’s already in therapy, has to participate in any further counselling deemed necessary by her probation officer.
She also was directed to provide a DNA sample for a national databank and will be on the national sex offender registry for 10 years.
Lenehan sentenced Allt to time served on a charge of breaching bail conditions that required her to remain away from children under the age of 16 “except when in the company of their parent.” She was found guilty last summer after admitting at trial that a nine-year-old friend of her daughter visited her Parkland Drive apartment in Halifax without a parent on multiple occasions in October 2016.
The defence argued that Allt had an honest mistaken belief of fact that that it was OK for the girl to be at her apartment as long as another adult was present. The court heard that Allt’s husband, Adam Harnish, was at the apartment during all the visits, including a sleepover.
