Inside Nova tells us that Tina Marie Amato plead guilty to sex with a student. Immediately, seeing the title, an image popped into my head of an older person taking advantage of a younger person–a sexual predator as it were. After I read the article, I am not so sure that is how it worked this time.
I knew one of the men who was arrested last year at one of the local schools. I have friends who knew the kids involved. Every last one of the professional adults I spoke with felt that the teacher was set up by this kid. Whoa! That’s a switch. Now am I saying the male teacher was innocent. Oh hell no. He was stupid, dumb and all the other words that pop up. And he was set up. He crossed a professional line that allowed him to be set up. He got what he deserved for not maintaining his professionalism.
I expect the same thing happened to Ms. Amato. She was convicted of :
“… three counts of taking indecent liberties with a minor by a custodian and one count of crimes against nature.”
We all know what that means without spelling it out. However, it marks Ms. Amato for life and puts her on the sex offenders list for time immemorial. If she ever gets her life straightened out and has a family, she probably won’t be able to even go to a parent-teacher conference for her own kid. She has destroyed any chances she ever had of a teaching career.
