Her hair was stylishly slicked back behind her girlishly pretty face and colored a hue which has become her signature platinum blonde. Dressed in a patterned skirt and a black blazer opened to a deceivingly conservative blouse, Debra Lafave marched self-assuredly beside her attorney into a Florida press conference this afternoon. She sat arrogantly stone-faced while the public learned that the sexual molestation charges involving her 14 year old student had been dropped.
Her attorney hopes that she will eventually 'fade to a foot-note', but such is something that sexual predators rarely do.
Lafave smirked carelessly as she unfolded a piece of yellow stationary which held words she ultimately delivered in a fashion more like an Oscar-winning acceptance speech than a gratefully humble acknowledgement of heavily pardoned guilt.
While consistently citing her dedication to prayer, she spoke of herself as a crusader of truth, a scapegoat in the battle to prove that 'mental illness is real' and can cause 'good people to do bad things.' Eventually said illness was identified as bipolar disorder, a disease characterized by dramatic shifts from depressive to manic moods, an illness not directly associated with any sexually predatory or deviant behavior.
During the question and answer period with the press, she criticized the media for under-reporting and misunderstanding her alleged disease. 'I challenge you (the media) to read a book or an article on bipolar illness.'
When asked about her greatest regret, Lafave briefly mentioned her guilt for sleeping with her 14 year old student before blaming the media for being an invader of the boy's privacy. It may well have been that Lafave was not married during the time of her offense. She never mentioned her ex-husband during her comments today, and an apology for the devastation and embarrassment she cause him seemed to be the least of her now greatly reduced concerns.
She's looking to an unmarred future despite the turmoil she is responsible for. Apparently, it's an online journalism course that has currently stuck fancy with the ex-teacher. 'God has given me a great outlet to write.'
Team Lafave exclaimed, 'Well, it's over!' in this afternoon's courtroom, but Lafave's ex-husband husband Owen isn't satisfied ignoring this particularly loose end. He is currently filming the documentary 'After School', a Powerhouse Pictures film, in which he narrates an in depth look at the suggested double standard which exists within the twisted world of student-teacher sex scandals. It looks as though Debra Lafave will never issue an apology to the other, forgotten victim of her crimes. She doesn't have to. However, through the film, Owen Lafave hopes to move past artificial apologies and discover the reason behind why teachers sleep with their young students and, most importantly, why society lets them.
Elizabeth Licorish
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