A prosecutor is writing language for proposed legislation that would make it a crime for Kansas teachers to have sex with students.
In the wake of an area high school teacher's alleged affair with a 17-year-old student and another such case under investigation, a prosecutor is moving to put some new teeth in the law.
Johnson County Dist. Atty. Paul Morrison said he is drafting language for a new law that would make it illegal for Kansas secondary school teachers to have sex with students.
State Rep. Robert Tomlinson, R-Roeland Park, said he planned to file the proposed legislation before the start of next year's session.
"It's just one of those situations that's just ripe for abuse because there's such a power differential," Morrison said.
Currently, many school districts have policies that forbid teachers from having sexual relationships with students, and many could lose their jobs in such cases.
The Lawrence school district, however, is not among them.
The district has policies dealing with inappropriate conduct -- including hostility based on race and gender -- and sexual harassment of students, but it has no policy dealing with teachers having sexual relationships with students.
Harassment vs. crime
"We don't have anything specifically on inappropriate student-teacher relationships," said Julie Boyle, director of communications for the district.
However, Assistant Supt. Randy Weseman said, "Obviously, (district policy) treats having sex with a student as a form of harassment."
Morrison's proposal would allow prosecutors to file criminal charges against teachers who have sex with students. He said the charge should be a low-level felony. And teachers could be prosecuted regardless of whether the relationship was consensual.
"The vast majority of the teaching profession will agree" with the proposal, said Tomlinson, who was a teacher at an alternative school for 15 years in Roeland Park. "There is no professional educator of any merit that believes it's appropriate to have sex with your students."
Morrison said he wanted to make sure the proposed measure didn't conflict with existing laws addressing indecent liberties with a child.
Current law
Under current law, anyone can be charged with that offense if he or she has sexual contact with a child under age 16.
Morrison said his measure could be added to laws that cover unlawful sexual conduct. Those laws makes it a crime for corrections officers and juvenile facility employees to have sexual contact with inmates or juvenile offenders, he said.
"We want to make it a separate offense for secondary teachers," Morrison said.
He said the measure would cover all secondary students younger than 18.
"It's my feeling that we'd get into a whole other set of problems if we tried to include people who were 18 in there," Morrison said.
Morrison said the idea for the law was prompted by the case of a Johnson County teacher who is charged with contributing to a child's misconduct -- a misdemeanor -- for an alleged affair with a student.
Morrison's office filed the misdemeanor charge after failing to find a more serious charge that would apply.
"Whenever a district attorney has to search that hard to find something to charge with, we have a problem with our laws," Tomlinson said.
Closing a loophole
Morrison said his office was investigating a second such case in which a male teacher allegedly had sex with a 17-year-old student.
"We've got two of those cases working in our county. I think it's probably a needed law," he said.
Douglas County Dist. Atty. Christine Kenney Tonkovich said she thought Morrison's idea could close a legal loophole for students ages 16 and 17.
She said she couldn't recall a case in Douglas County involving a teacher was having sex with a student.
"That's one thing we haven't had to address in Douglas County, but I can see how there could be a gap in the statutes for 16- and 17-year-old students," she said.
Weseman said the proposed legislation was "intriguing."
"This typically has not been a problem for us," he said, but added, "If legislation solves that problem, then I would see it as being welcome."
-- Michael Dekker's phone message number is 832-7187. His e-mail address is mdekker@ljworld.com.
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