JACKSONVILLE, Fla. -- No jail time is on tap for the Duval County teacher who pleaded guilty to sleeping with one of her students from Atlantic Coast High. Danielle Reed walks away from the case with five years probation.
She wasn't home when Action News paid her a visit Friday. But Reed's neighbors are still reeling.
"That's really unacceptable," said Chantel Simon.
As a former teacher herself, Simon was baffled by the sentence.
"I'm not a parent but if I were, I would have liked to see something a little bit harsher because that's going to change that student's life forever."
We wanted to find out whether the penalty really fit the crime. We took that question to attorney Dale Carson. He feels there is a double standard depending on whether the teacher is a man or a woman.
"If a male attacks an underage child, we all feel as though he's an animal he needs to be boxed up and kept away from the rest of us because he's not fit to be in society with the rest of us," he said. "We don't believe that so much for women."
Carson says Reed's charges were reduced to child abuse as part of the plea deal. Had it remained felony sexual battery, she could have received a sentence of 30 years in prison per count. He says it is a move families will often make to save their child from having to go to trial.
"Children who are forced to testify in these circumstances in front of a courtroom and a courtroom proceeding are injured by that testimony," Carson said.
We did some digging into the sentences of past teachers accused of similar crimes. One of the most publicized cases in Florida was Debra Lafave. She pleaded guilty in 2004 to sleeping with a 14-year-old and received three years of house arrest, seven years probation and had to register as a sex offender.
Leonard Hoffman also pleaded guilty in March to sleeping with a 16-year-old and was sentenced to one year in jail and eight years probation.
Christopher Bacca and Michael Worrell haven't been sentenced yet.
