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SALT LAKE CITY — A West High School teacher accused of engaging in an illegal sexual relationship with a 17-year-old student was charged with seven felonies on Wednesday.
Sterrett "Rett" Neale, 54, of Salt Lake City, is charged in 3rd District Court with three counts of object rape and two counts of forcible sodomy, first-degree felonies; as well as two counts of forcible sexual abuse, a second-degree felony.
Neale, a creative writing and language arts teacher, engaged in sex acts with a 17-year-old girl starting in March 2017 when she was attending West High and continued after she graduated, according to a Salt Lake County Jail report.
Their first encounter happened in Neale's classroom, according to charging documents. In the summer of 2017 when Neale's wife wasn't home, he invited the girl to his Millcreek house. She drove to St. Mark's Hospital and he picked her up there and took her to his house to engage in sexual acts, the charges state.
"(The girl) states that she and Neale had multiple sexual encounters like this at his home prior to her 18th birthday," according to charging documents.
"The victim disclosed this would occur once every week to once every other week from August of 2017 to February of 2019,” the report states.
Neale was arrested April 24 in his classroom just as school was about to start for the day. He has been with the Salt Lake School District since 1994.
If Neale is able to post bail, the Salt Lake County District Attorney's Office asked a judge to require that he wear a GPS monitor and have no contact with anyone under the age of 18.
