Teacher charged in sending explicit video, pictures to students

An English teacher at a middle school in South Ozone Park has been charged with sending sexual videos and electronic messages to three of his 12-year-old female students.
“The defendant, who just began his teaching career last month, is accused of providing his students with an e-mail address to which they could contact him with questions about their schoolwork and then turning around and using their e-mail addresses to send indecent messages and pictures to them,”said District Attorney Richard A. Brown. “This case should serve as a clear and unmistakable warning that law enforcement is prepared to apprehend and prosecute sexual predators who betray and defile youngsters.”
Brown identified the defendant as Umesh Ramjattan, 22, of 91-71 115th Street in Richmond Hill.
Ramjattan, a first-year teacher at M.S. 137 in South Ozone Park, is presently being held pending arraignment in Queens Criminal Court on charges of disseminating indecent material to minors in the first degree and endangering the welfare of a child. If convicted, he faces up to seven years in prison.
According to the charges, one of Ramjattan’s female seventh-grade students sent an e-mail on September 29 to the e-mail address the defendant had provided the class (mrramjattan@gmail.com) to ask him a question about school work.
Soon thereafter, it is alleged that Ramjattan began instant messaging her from the screen name mrramjattan1@aol.com with questions that were both sexually suggestive and of a personal nature and that, on October 3, he sent her (via e-mail from umeshr85@yahoo.com) a video of him and his girlfriend having sexual intercourse.
It is further charged that a second female student who e-mailed the defendant about her homework began receiving instant messages from him through his AOL account on September 29 that contained questions of a personal nature and that, sometime in early October, she received a picture of the defendant not wearing a shirt.
Finally, it is alleged that a third female student who e-mailed the defendant for help with her homework began receiving instant messages from him through his AOL account that were both personal and sexual in nature.
An investigation began when the parents of one of the students notified school authorities that Ramjattan had e-mailed a sexual video to their daughter and the school, in turn, notified the police.
The defendant was arrested on Thursday, October 25 and, in statements allegedly made to police, admitted to having inappropriate instant message conversations with the three young victims and sending inappropriate video and images of himself.
According to Dina Paul Parks, spokesperson for the Department of Education (DOE), Ramjattan “has been reassigned pending the outcome of the case.”
Although not currently teaching in a classroom, he is nevertheless still employed by the DOE.
Paul Parks went on to say that the alleged victims can seek help if they so choose.
“Our youth development staff [guidance counselors/social workers] is available to them,” she said.