A married Illinois special education teacher accused of molesting a 15-year-old student told police that she’s being set up by the teen — and that she was targeted for being “good looking.”
Christina Formella, 30, a teacher and soccer coach at Downers Grove South High School, insisted to cops she’s a “good person,” but that “everybody” comes after her because of her looks, according to documents obtained by WGN9.
The sporty dirty blonde denied having sex with the teenage student, and said that he accused her of having an inappropriate relationship with him because she “cared too much about him,” the documents show.
Formella — who married her college sweetheart in August last year — allegedly sexually assaulted the boy before the start of the school day in December 2023, DuPage County prosecutors said.
She claimed that the student had broken into her phone and used her number to send the inappropriate messages to her as a “blackmail” plot, investigators said.
“She claimed that one day, [the boy] had grabbed her phone unattended, had entered her passcode … had sent the message to his phone, had then deleted the message from her phone, and had saved it to his phone as blackmail,” the court documents read.
The messages were discovered last month by the victim’s mother after she bought him a new phone and linked it to his iCloud account, DuPage County prosecutors said.
Formella allegedly told the victim, “I love having sex with you,” in messages reportedly sent in 2023 when she was 28, court documents show.
“I know baby I love it so much … It feels so good … It’s so passionate … It’s so intimate … It’s so perfect,” the boy reportedly responded to Formella. “I love you so so much mama.”
The relationship continued until the student broke it off, according to prosecutors.
When the messages were discovered, the mother took her son to Downers Grove police station and reported the alleged abuse.
Formella was charged with two counts of aggravated criminal sexual abuse and one count of criminal sexual assault, and was released on the condition that she not enter the school grounds or have contact with anybody under 18.
She has also been placed on paid leave from her job.
Students have been urged to come forward to police or the school if they saw anything dangerous or unusual, and authorities will take “all reports seriously,” Board of Education President Don Renner said on Monday in a statement to the board.
Formella has denied the allegations against her and insisted she never had sex with the student.
She earned her teaching license in 2017, shortly after leaving Concordia University Chicago, where she and her husband met as student athletes. He played baseball, she played soccer.
Formella had been teaching at Downers Grove High since 2020, according to her LinkedIn.
New bodycam footage shows Formella breaking down in tears during her arrest on March 16, according to a video published by the YouTube channel Ape Huncho.
“I feel like I’m gonna throw up,” she said, as she sobbed into her cuffed hands and pulled her knees up to her chest.
Formella’s next court appearance is scheduled for April 14.
Read the full article here