We have previously reported on sex crimes against minors in Kentucky, and this morning, the Lexington Herald-Leader continued an investigative effort that began at the end of 2022, with the story “Kentucky’s laws on teacher sexual misconduct are weak. Here’s what needs to change.

Kentucky lawmakers failed to address teacher sex abuse last year. Will they in 2024?

by Beth Musgrave and Valarie Honeycutt Spears | Thursday, February 1, 2024 | 11:00 AM EST | Updated: 11:30 AM EST

Andrew Zaheri, mugshot via Rowan County Detention Center and is a public record.

It started with massages for leg cramps after soccer practice when she was 14.Andrew Zaheri’s attentions to the teenage girl quickly escalated, according to court documents.

No, of course what my best friend used to call the Herald-Liberal didn’t include Mr Zaheri’s mugshot, but at The First Street Journal we believe such to be public records, and do publish them.

The former Rowan County soccer coach and teacher eventually made the girl his teaching assistant. He bought her clothes and presents. Soon, the two were spotted at Wal-Mart and other places after hours.

In May 2023, the student, identified as Jane Doe in the lawsuit, and her parents sued Zaheri and Rowan County School District leaders alleging multiple school district employees knew of the relationship and failed to report it to authorities over several years.

A school counselor was eventually tipped off about the relationship between Jane Doe and Zaheri. The counselor reported it to authorities in February 2023, according to the lawsuit.

In May, Zaheri was indicted on 23 counts related to his sexual relationship with the student.

The family alleged in the lawsuit this was not the first time Zaheri’s relationship with a female student has been questioned.

There’s a lot more to the story, which you can read here.

The lawsuit claims that Mr Zaheri had previously engaged in a sexual relationship with a different female student, while he was an assistant basketball coach at the same school, between 2007 and 2011, and impregnated her after she was graduated. The suit further alleges that school officials knew of the relationship, and did nothing about it.

Mr Zaheri has been charged with:

• KRS §510.060(1)(d) Rape in the third degree, 10 counts, a Class D felony;
• KRS §510.090(1)(d) Sodomy in the third degree, 10 counts, a Class D felony;
• KRS §531.320 Promoting a sexual performance by a minor, 2 counts. Under subsection (2), this is a Class C felony if the minor was aged 16 or 17, or a Class B felony if the minor was less than 16 years old.

Under KRS §532.060:

• (2)(b) the penalty for a Class B felony is not less than ten (10) years nor more than twenty (20) years;
• (2)(c) the penalty for a Class C felony is not less than five (5) years nor more than ten (10) years; and
• (2)(d) the penalty for a Class D felony not less than one (1) year nor more than five (5) years.

Think about these penalties: if convicted on all charges, Mr Zaheri could be sentenced to just five years in prison, if the sentences were set to run concurrently. We have previously reported how some teachers have gotten lenient plea bargain deals.

The problem that the Herald-Leader story says needs to be fixed could be fixed much more simply and easily, by making all sex with minor students by school administrators, teachers and staff a Class A felony, the penalty for which is imprisonment for not less than twenty (20) years nor more than fifty (50) years, or life imprisonment, and not allowing such cases to plead down to lower class felonies, and to specify the failure of a mandatory reporter constitutes a Class B felony. The prospect of spending at least ten years behind bars ought to be enough to stop the people who knew of Mr Zaheri’s (alleged) activities from turning a blind eye toward them. Kentucky law (KRS §620.050) already holds harmless mandatory reporters who report suspected abuse if those suspicions were reasonable and in good faith even if the suspected abuse turns out not to have occurred.

It may not be possible to prevent first sexual offenses, but has Mr Zaheri been reported to law enforcement, and treated harshly under the law, his second (alleged) offense would not have occurred, because he’d have been in prison. If we subjected mandatory reporters to harsh penalties for not doing their duty, the school officials in Rowan County who (allegedly) knew and kept their mouths shut would not have done so. If we have a case in which mandatory reporters still keep their mouths shut getting locked up for ten years, all of the other mandatory reporters would hear about it, and realize that it could be them as well, if they don’t do their jobs.

Most complicated problems actually have fairly simple solutions.