Ex-teacher admits sex assault, abuse of two former Carpentersville students
A 31-year-old Geneva woman faces prison after admitting to sexually assaulting and abusing two of her former students from Carpentersville Middle School.
Lindsay P. Anderson, of the 900 block of Foxwood Drive, pleaded guilty late last week to one count each of criminal sexual assault and aggravated criminal sexual abuse, both felonies, according to Kane County prosecutors and court records.
According to prosecutors, Anderson sexually assaulted two male students between July 2013 and May 2015. Anderson knew both victims from when she was employed at Carpentersville Middle School but was not their teacher when the assaults took place, prosecutors said.
According to court records, the victims were 14 and 15 at the time of the attacks.
Anderson also worked as a coach at Dundee-Crown High School. She taught at Community Unit District 300 through September 2014.
“Ms. Anderson leveraged her position as a teacher to gain these victims' trust and then selfishly took advantage of that trust,” Kane County State's Attorney Joe McMahon said. “As a teacher, she was in a position of authority and clearly knew that what she did was wrong and harmful to these children.”
According to a police affidavit used to secure a search warrant, authorities began investigating in May 2015 after the mother of one boy called East Dundee police to report her suspicions.
The woman said Anderson would drive her son, who had since graduated from middle school, home from football practice and would “buy him things and take him places,” according to the affidavit.
The 15-year-old boy told investigators at the Kane County Child Advocacy Center that Anderson picked him up once in a gray Jeep and the two went to Raceway Woods Forest Preserve where they smoked marijuana provided by Anderson and she assaulted him, according to the affidavit. She gave a video-recorded statement in which she admitted to the acts, the affidavit said.
Anderson also acknowledged sexual assault “several times” — including once in a Carpentersville movie theater parking lot — of a 14-year-old, whom she knew from the middle school but saw only when he got into trouble, according the affidavit.
Friday, Anderson entered a “cold” or “blind” plea in which a defendant admits guilt without an agreed-upon sentence with prosecutors and instead leaves it in the hands of a judge, in this case, D.J. Tegeler.
Anderson faces from four to 22 years in prison on Dec. 6 when sentenced, along with lifetime registration as a sex offender.
A message left for Anderson's defense attorney, Peter Buh, was not returned.