Former teacher charged with rape of teenage boy appears in court
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ST. ANTHONY — A former high school teacher who was arrested and charged with rape of a teenage boy appeared in a Fremont County courthouse Monday afternoon.
Jessica Lawson, 36, is charged with two counts of felony rape of a victim who is 16 or 17 years of age, felony delivery of a controlled substance, and misdemeanor dispensing alcohol to a minor.
Lawson appeared in court for her preliminary hearing before Magistrate Judge Aaron Thompson. She previously posted $250,000 bond and was released from jail. During the hearing Monday, Lawson wore a light-colored sweater with black pants and what appeared to be black Converse high-top shoes with an ankle monitor on her right leg. Her hair was down and she carried a black backpack with her.
Lawson sat alongside her attorney, Allen Browning, and waived her preliminary hearing. She will now be bound over to District Court for an arraignment, where she will enter a plea.
That arraignment date has not yet been officially set.
Background
Lawson was a South Fremont High School teacher from 2021 until 2023, according to Fremont County Joint School District #215.
According to court documents, on Nov. 6, an officer with the St. Anthony Police Department initiated a traffic stop on a car for having no visible tail lights. The driver was a teenage boy, and the car was determined to be Lawson’s.
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The teenager told the officer that Lawson had allowed him to drive her car “due to her being too drunk to drive,” according to police reports. Court documents say the minor admitted to having marijuana and was driven home by the officer.
Later that morning, the officer got a phone call from the minor’s parents, who said the boy had told them more information.
According to the parents, their son had been picked up by Lawson around 11 p.m. the night before and taken to her house in St. Anthony. The boy told his parents Lawson got drunk and he got high before the two had sex.
During an interview later with police, the boy said Lawson had given him marijuana while at her house and then the two had sex.
According to court documents, Lawson later called the teenager’s mother and admitted to picking him up from his house, taking him to her house and providing him with alcohol. She admitted to having marijuana in her house but said she did not give it to the boy.
She reportedly denied that “anything else had occurred.”
Though Lawson has been charged with these crimes, it does not necessarily mean she committed them. Everyone is presumed innocent until they are proven guilty.
