$2.25 million was paid by a California school district to the victims of a former teacher, who previously pleaded guilty to sexually abusing three students, after giving birth to one of their babies.
The teacher in question, Laura Whitehurst, was arrested in 2013 and gave birth in 2014.
Redlands Unified School District’s recent multi-million dollar settlement brings its total amount paid to Whitehurst’s victims up to a whopping $8.25 million.
Whitehurst, a former English teacher and a school soccer coach, had previously pleaded guilty to unlawful sex with three of her former students. Whitehurst was initially charged with 41 felony counts of unlawful sex with a minor.
The then-28-year-old teacher was ordered to forfeit her teaching credentials and register as a sex offender, in addition to her six-month jail sentence.
Whitehurst was initially sued by two former students after her arrest, which ended with a $6 million settlement to one of the students in 2016, who was the father of her child. However, Whitehurst was sued in 2021 by a third former student who claimed she preyed on him in 2007 and 2008 when he was just 14 years old.
Whitehurst admitted to having sex with the boy at least 15 times inside her classroom and also at her apartment.
Whitehurst was busted after teachers uncovered her doing to the then-Citrus Valley principal, Bernie Cavanagh, and claimed they had concerns about a student whose grades sharply declined. The investigation led Cavanagh to question Whitehurst, who said she was a confidant for the boy at the time.
Whitehurst had told Cavanagh that the boy told her his girlfriend was pregnant and he was having a tough time keeping it all together. She said he was very stressed with a baby on the way, school, getting ready for college, AP tests, and graduation.
” I then asked another teacher if Laura had shared with him when the boys girlfriend was due to give birth. He told me it was around the same time Laura was due,” Cavanagh wrote in a school memo that was later used as evidence in the trial.
After Whitehurst gave birth to a baby girl, she had agreed to plead guilty to six of her 41 felony charges.
The baby girl’s 17-year-old father reportedly spoke out against Whitehurst’s plea deal.
“Whitehurst’s criminal actions against me have scarred me emotionally and will affect every relationship I have for the rest of my life,” the young man told the judge in court.
