Teacher faces more charges in sex inquiry

By Scott North

Herald Writer

A Snohomish County elementary school teacher accused of sexual contact with teen-age boys now is facing half a dozen felonies.

Susan G. Lemery, 37, of Marysville had been charged with two counts of third-degree child rape and one count of third-degree child molestation.

At a brief hearing Monday, deputy prosecutor Lisa Paul doubled the number of felonies facing Lemery, adding an additional child rape charge and two more counts of child molestation, all in the third degree.

The new charges reflect more fully the state’s theory that Lemery engaged in repeated sexual contact with two 14-year-old boys from Marysville who are friends of her son, the prosecutor told Judge Kenneth Cowsert.

Paul also said she’d offered Lemery the opportunity to plead guilty to the original charges, but the defendant had declined.

The offer came after sophisticated genetic tests showed that a semen stain on a comforter on Lemery’s bed contained a mixture of her cells and cells from one of the boys, Paul alleged.

The DNA test results show a one in 4.8 trillion chance that the female cells found are anyone other than Lemery’s and a one in 29.7 billion chance that the semen comes from someone other than the boy.

The boy alleged he and Lemery engaged in sex on top of the comforter on her bed. The dark blue comforter was seized from Lemery’s bedroom when she was arrested in June and sent to the Washington State Patrol crime lab for analysis.

Lemery was a popular second-grade teacher in the Mukilteo School District. None of the charges stem from activities with her students. She is on paid leave while the charges are pending

Her trial is scheduled for Feb. 4.

You can call Herald Writer Scott North at 425-339-3431

or send e-mail to north@heraldnet.com.

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