The identity of a former trainee teacher who groomed and had sex a 15-year-old student can finally be revealed after a gag order prohibiting the publishing of her name and the school in question was revoked by the courts.
Petra Shasha, 28, was found guilty of sexually abusing, grooming, and indecently assaulting the school student in the ACT Supreme Court this week. The "relationship" she had fostered with the 15-year-old came to an end after she was arrested in February 2022, as her name had already been reported. The court was told that Shasha first developed a bond with the St Edmunds College student while serving as a pre-service teacher.
Preyed on Student Slowly
She was at the school for three weeks in late 2020 as a pre-service teacher. Although Shasha was 24 at the time, her relationship with the boy became so close that he believed they were a couple.
She systematically groomed the young child, according to the prosecutors, by offering him rides, expensive clothing, and other gifts, as well as money transfers, in order to get him to engage in sexual activity.
Following a single day of deliberation, the jury found Shasha guilty of grooming and indecently abusing children, providing pornographic material to a minor, and persistently abusing children sexually.
On the other hand, Shasha's conviction for separate grooming and indecent act against a minor was overturned.
The victim told police that Shasha openly spent time with him in public and had even devised plans for how to react if they encountered someone they knew.
"We always said, if we see anyone we know, just keep walking," he said, according to the Canberra Times. "We didn't want anyone to see."
Never Taught, Only had Sex
The court was told that Shasha never directly taught the boy but frequently spent time with his group of friends during lunch. After her time at the school ended, the boy contacted her on social media, and they continued to communicate regularly while she worked at the nearby Canberra Girls Grammar School.
She was found guilty of the former incident even though she denied ever touching the youngster indecently twice—once in a David Jones changing room and secondly in a vehicle.
Shasha did, however, acknowledge admit that she gave him multiple nude photos and videos of herself, but only after he turned 16, the legal age of consent.
Even though Shasha sent him some "revealing... cleavage" photos of herself when he was only 15, she insisted that she had a "reasonable belief" that he was a year older.
The boy's admission that he had lied to Shasha regarding his age and academic standing, according to her attorney, "provides her a defense" at the start of the trial. According to what the court heard, Shasha contacted the victim to let him know he "is 'not a f***ing victim'" after learning that police were looking into their relationship.
"Baby, don't f*** with me please, my ears are burning," she was heard saying on a different recording. Shasha is out on bond pending her February sentencing.
