Source: Scripps Howard
March 17, 2008 Author: CRISTINA ROUVALIS
Jason Eickmeyer was a 15-year-old New Jersey sophomore the night he said he had sex with his gym teacher. From that moment on, he counted the days until he would be old enough to marry her.
Male classmates at Hammonton High School who heard the rumors would nudge him on the shoulder, he said, and give him a knowing smile. "I got respect," he said.
But two years later, after the police came to his house and took his statement about teacher Traci Tapp, Eickmeyer was shunned and mocked. He became a Jay Leno punch line.
Friends would ask him, "How could you say you were victimized by having sex with a teacher? She was hot. She was young. She was the best thing that ever happened to you."
Turns out, he said, it was the worst thing. He stopped going to many classes, dropped out of wrestling (his ticket to a college scholarship) and became depressed. And now the 20-year-old has sued the school district, Hammonton township and Tapp, who lost her job but served no jail time after pleading guilty to harassment by offensive touching.
"When we find out it is a male teacher having sex with a female student, he should be locked away and the key should be thrown away," Eickmeyer said. "If it is a female teacher, she isn't looked on as harshly as a male."
Is there is a double standard? Are female predators an under-reported danger or merely a titillating novelty?
In recent months in Western Pennsylvania alone, three cases came into the spotlight:
-- Abbie Jane Swogger, a 34-year-old special education aide at Highlands Senior High School, was charged with drug violations and corruption of minors after police found her in a New Kensington hotel with students.
-- Beth Ann Chester, 26, a former Moon Township teacher, is headed to trial on accusations of having sex with a 14-year-old boy.
-- Julie Stimmel, a North Allegheny High School teacher in Wexford resigned after being suspected of having a sexual relationship with a 17-year-old student and has surrendered her state teaching certificate. Prosecutors said they could not proceed with the case because the student was unwilling to testify.
Gordon Finley, psychology professor at Florida International University in Miami, believes such cases are just the tip of the problem.
"We need to remove the veil of political incorrectness and look at it honestly. We have tons of research on male sexual predators and very little on females," Finley said. "We need to acknowledge that it is not insignificant numbers."
As Finley does, Robert Shoop, a Kansas State University professor and author of "Sexual Exploitation in Schools: How to Spot It and Stop It," believes female predators often get lighter sentences than males, even though the behavior is equally destructive.
"The female is likely to get a suspended sentence," Shoop said. "A male is likely to get a 20-year sentence."
Charol Shakeshaft, a Virginia Commonwealth University professor who wrote a 2004 U.S. Department of Education report on school sexual misconduct, disagrees.
"You see two or three cases where women are not getting sentences" and people take that as evidence that women get off light generally, Shakeshaft said, noting that her research suggests there aren't "gender differences in severity of sentences."
Though sexual abuse is considered an underreported crime, Shakeshaft's report showed that 10 percent of all students said they had been the victim of sexual misconduct by an adult working in a school. And in nearly a third of those cases, the students said the incidents occurred with female teachers and employees, who make up the overwhelming majority of staff.
Among all adults, sexual predators are 95 percent male, said David Finkelhor, director of Crimes against Children Research Center at the University of New Hampshire. Some men are pedophiles, who tend to be repeat offenders with children 12 and younger, leaving a wider swath of destruction, he said. But when females are sexual predators, they tend to abuse teenagers.
"They flirt and carry on a friendship," Shoop said. "They write their name on their books. They text-message them. They are not in love with the child, but they are using them for sexual gratification."
