By Anna Gustafson
A former Forest Hills middle school teacher was sent to jail last week after allegedly violating probation he had received after pleading guilty last year to sending sexual messages to adolescent boys online, Queens District Attorney Richard Brown’s office said.
Queens Supreme Court Judge William Erlbaum ordered Levittown resident Bradley Dieffenbacher, 33, to jail last Friday after the former teacher at Middle School 190 in Forest Hills allegedly answered an ad on craigslist.com for a math tutor. Dieffenbacher was not supposed to teach in any capacity after he was convicted last year of luring adolescent boys into online sex, according to the DA’s office.
Nassau County police are also investigating whether Dieffenbacher had sent hundreds of instant messages soliciting sex from minors from his computer in his E−ZPass office in Great Neck, L.I., according to the DA’s office.
Dieffenbacher was scheduled to be sentenced at Supreme Court Tuesday, but the sentencing was adjourned until June 16.
Dieffenbacher resigned from the Forest Hills school in February 2008 and lost his teaching license after he plead guilty to sending eight of his 12− and 13−year−old math students sexually explicit messages and forwarded them pornographic links online between April 2007 and February 2008, according to the DA’s office. The math teacher also asked students to use a Web camera to perform sexual acts, the complaint said.
Besides the 10 years of probation, Dieffenbacher was sentenced to six months in jail last year.
Reach reporter Anna Gustafson by e−mail at agustafson@cnglocal.com or by phone at 718−229−0300, Ext. 174.
