California 'teacher of the year' sexually assaulted elementary school boys. She gets 30-year term
Jacqueline Ma took advantage of her role as a fifth- and sixth-grade teacher at Lincoln Acres Elementary to manipulate her victims, luring them with gifts, special attention and even completing their homework, according to the San Diego County district attorney's office.
When one of her victims was not allowed access to social media or personal electronic devices at home, she went so far as to set up an unsanctioned after-school program and directed him to message her through a school chat application, prosecutors said.
The 36-year-old teacher pleaded guilty in February to two counts of forcible lewd acts on a child, one count of a lewd act on a child, and one count of possessing child sexual abuse material.
Read more: Los Angeles jury awards $48 million to students abused by teacher at South El Monte school
She was arrested by the National City Police Department in March 2023 after the mother of one of the victims reported inappropriate messages she found between her son and Ma on a family tablet. Investigators learned that Ma had groomed the boy for more than a year before sexually abusing him when he was 12 years old.
Ma performed sexual acts on the boy in her classroom over a three-month period, while his parents thought he was participating in an after-school basketball program, prosecutors said.
Investigators also discovered that she had groomed and sexually assaulted a second victim, an 11-year-old boy, in 2020.
"This defendant violated the trust she had with her students in the most extreme and traumatic way possible and her actions are despicable," Dist. Atty. Summer Stephan said in a statement. "Her victims will have to deal with a lifetime of negative effects and her 30-year sentence is appropriate."
Ma was named teacher of the year for the 2022-23 academic year by the San Diego County Office of Education. She earned her bachelor's degree in biology and master's degree in education from UC San Diego and had taught fifth and sixth grades in the National School District since 2013, according to a profile in the San Diego Union-Tribune.
She used her reputation as an above-and-beyond educator who was personally invested in her students' success to gain the trust of victims' parents, prosecutors said.
"No child deserves what this defendant did," said Stephan. "I hope this sentence brings a measure of justice to the victims, their families and the community that was left reeling from this defendant's crimes."
Sign up for Essential California for news, features and recommendations from the L.A. Times and beyond in your inbox six days a week.
This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
2 days ago
- Yahoo
Feds charge SoCal medical workers with interfering in ICE raid
Two staff members from an Ontario surgery center have been charged with allegedly interfering with U.S. immigration officers trying to detain landscapers who ran into the center to escape. Jose de Jesus Ortega, a 38-year-old Highland resident, was arrested Friday morning and is expected to appear in U.S. District Court in Riverside, according to a U.S. attorney's office Central District of California news release. Officials are still looking for the other suspect, Danielle Nadine Davila, 33, of Corona. Both are charged with assaulting a federal officer and conspiracy to prevent by force and intimidation a federal officer from discharging his duties, authorities said. According to video obtained by KTLA-TV, staffers at the Ontario Advanced Surgical Center earlier this month told two agents to leave because they didn't have a warrant to go onto the property. The agents with Immigration and Customs Enforcement were trying to detain 30-year-old Denis Guillen-Solis and two other landscapers who had been working outside and ran into the surgical center when the agents showed up. In the video, Guillen-Solis is shown holding onto the doorway at the surgical center and asking the agents to present identification. The agents then pulled Guillen-Solis from the doorway and detained him. 'The illegal alien arrested inside the surgery center was not a patient. He ran inside for cover and these defendants attempted to block his apprehension by assaulting our agents," said U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli in a statement. According to an affidavit, the two ICE agents wore government-issued equipment, including vests and were using unmarked government-operated vehicles when they conducted their operations. The agents followed a truck with three men inside and approached them after the men exited the truck in the parking lot of the surgery center, according to the release. Two of the men ran away and one of them, an alleged undocumented immigrant from Honduras, was detained near the surgery center's front entrance and tried to pull away, causing the ICE officer to fall to the ground. A medical staffer helped the man off the ground and pulled him away from the officer, according to the news release. The man went into the surgery center and was chased by the ICE agent, who eventually stopped him. The incident occurred amid an extraordinary immigration enforcement effort by the Trump administration in Southern California. Thousands of unauthorized immigrants — many without a criminal record — have been detained at work, in courthouses and on public streets going about their day. Sign up for Essential California for news, features and recommendations from the L.A. Times and beyond in your inbox six days a week. This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
Chicago Tribune
3 days ago
- Chicago Tribune
UnitedHealth says it is under a federal investigation and cooperating
UnitedHealth Group says it is cooperating with federal criminal and civil investigations involving its market-leading Medicare business. The health care giant said Thursday that it had contacted the Department of Justice after reviewing media reports about investigations into certain elements of its business. '(UnitedHealth) has a long record of responsible conduct and effective compliance,' the company said in a Securities and Exchange Commission filing. Earlier this year, The Wall Street Journal said federal officials had launched a civil fraud investigation into how the company records diagnoses that lead to extra payments for its Medicare Advantage, or MA, plans. Those are privately run versions of the government's Medicare coverage program mostly for people ages 65 and over. The company's UnitedHealthcare business covers more than 8 million people as the nation's largest provider of Medicare Advantage plans. The business has been under pressure in recent quarters due to rising care use and rate cuts. The Journal said in February, citing anonymous sources, that the probe focused on billing practices in recent months. The paper has since said that a federal criminal health care-fraud unit was investigating how the company used doctors and nurses to gather diagnoses that bolster payments. UnitedHealth said in the filing Thursday that it 'has full confidence in its practices and is committed to working cooperatively with the Department throughout this process.' UnitedHealth Group Inc. runs one of the nation's largest health insurance and pharmacy benefits management businesses. It also operates a growing Optum business that provides care and technology support. UnitedHealth raked in more than $400 billion in revenue last year to come in third in the Fortune 500 list of biggest U.S. companies. Its share price topped $630 last fall to reach a new all-time high. But the stock has mostly shed value since December, when UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson was fatally shot in midtown Manhattan on his way to the company's annual investor meeting. A suspect, Luigi Mangione, has been charged in connection with the shooting. In April, shares plunged some more after the company cut its forecast due to a spike in health care use. A month later, former CEO Andrew Witty resigned, and the company withdrew its forecast entirely, saying that medical costs from new Medicare Advantage members were higher than expected. The stock price was down more than 3%, or $10.73, to $281.78 Thursday afternoon. That represents a 55% drop from the all-time high it hit in November. Broader indexes were mixed. UnitedHealth will report its second-quarter results next Tuesday.
Fast Company
3 days ago
- Fast Company
UnitedHealth Group confirms DOJ investigation over Medicare billing
BY UnitedHealth Group says it is cooperating with federal criminal and civil investigations involving its market-leading Medicare business. The health care giant said Thursday that it had contacted the Department of Justice after reviewing media reports about investigations into certain elements of its business. '(UnitedHealth) has a long record of responsible conduct and effective compliance,' the company said in a Securities and Exchange Commission filing. Earlier this year, The Wall Street Journal said federal officials had launched a civil fraud investigation into how the company records diagnoses that lead to extra payments for its Medicare Advantage, or MA, plans. Those are privately run versions of the government's Medicare coverage program mostly for people ages 65 and over. The company's UnitedHealthcare business covers more than 8 million people as the nation's largest provider of Medicare Advantage plans. The business has been under pressure in recent quarters due to rising care use and rate cuts. The Journal said in February, citing anonymous sources, that the probe focused on billing practices in recent months. The paper has since said that a federal criminal health care-fraud unit was investigating how the company used doctors and nurses to gather diagnoses that bolster payments. UnitedHealth said in the filing Thursday that it 'has full confidence in its practices and is committed to working cooperatively with the Department throughout this process.' UnitedHealth Group Inc. runs one of the nation's largest health insurance and pharmacy benefits management businesses. It also operates a growing Optum business that provides care and technology support. UnitedHealth raked in more than $400 billion in revenue last year as the third-largest company in the Fortune 500. Its share price topped $630 last fall to reach a new all-time high. But the stock has mostly shed value since December, when UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson was fatally shot in midtown Manhattan on his way to the company's annual investor meeting. A suspect, Luigi Mangione, has been charged in connection with the shooting. In April, shares plunged some more after the company cut its forecast due to a spike in health care use. A month later, former CEO Andrew Witty resigned, and the company withdrew its forecast entirely, saying that medical costs from new Medicare Advantage members were higher than expected. The stock price slipped another 3%, or $10.35, to $282.16 in midday trading Thursday. That represents a 55% drop from its all-time high. The Dow Jones Industrial Average, of which UnitedHealth is a component, also fell slightly. Meanwhile, the broader S&P 500 rose. UnitedHealth will report its second-quarter results next Tuesday. —Tom Murphy, AP health writer
