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Suspended WASD teacher faces sexual assault-related charges

A suspended Williamsport Area School District teacher faces charges of allegedly having sexual relations with two Loyalsock Township School District female minors, including a former player on her basketball team three years ago when she served as a coach for the township school district, according to state police.

With her attorney by her side, Kelli Sarae Vassallo, 36, was arraigned before District Judge Gary A. Whiteman on felony charges of aggravated indecent assault, institutional sexual assault, corrupting the morals of a minor, illegal use of a communication device and one misdemeaor count of indecent assault.

Police allege Vassallo, of 1346 Lafayette Parkway, had an inappropriate sexual relationship with a 13-year-old girl in 2013 and 2014, and during part of that time the teen was on Vassallo’s basketball team.

The girl told investigators her coach had molested her “about 20 times” between the fall of 2013 and the late summer of 2014. The alleged sexual acts occurred at Vassallo’s Loyalsock Township residence as well as in an upstairs bedroom in a house in a second township property on Mansel Avenue, police said.

The alleged victim, now 16, told police in mid June that Vassallo “was helping her through a rough time” when she was 13 and that the relationship began with just texting and “hanging out with friends,” Trooper Jason Miller, the lead investigator, wrote in an affidavit.

In September 2013, Vassallo told the girl she “had feelings for her and that things progressed,” Miller said the victim told investigators. A week later, Vassallo allegedly “began touching the girl sexually,” the trooper added.

The girl also reported she and Vassallo took showers together.

Vassallo, a sixth-grade teacher at the Curtin Intermediate School on Eldred Street for several years, told the girl she knew what she was doing was wrong, “but she wanted to do it and liked it,” Miller said in the affidavit.

During her interview with police just months ago, the teen said “she was talking about this now because now that she’s older, she realized what happened to her was not OK,” Miller wrote in the affidavit.

Just days after the girl talked to police, a second alleged victim came to light; a woman, now in her early 20s, who claimed Vassallo allegedly molested her multiple times six years ago when she was 17 and a student in the township’s school district.

The relationship began in the fall of 2009 with Vassallo giving the student gifts, Miller said.

Upset that Vassallo was giving their daughter gifts, the girl’s parents drew up papers, “preventing Vassallo from contacting their daughter. However, Vassallo continued the contact, using other people’s phones and Facebook pages. The teen thought it was OK to still be talking with her since Vassallo was an adult and reaching out to her,” Miller wrote in the affidavit.

The following summer, the relationship between the two allegedly became physical, investigators were told.

When this same teen was first questioned by state police in September 2010 about an alleged inappropriate relationship with Vassallo, the girl denied any such relationship “and the case was closed,” Miller said.

The Lycoming County Department of Children and Youth as well as the the Child Advocacy Center in Sunbury assisted state police with their investigation.

Vassallo, a sixth-grade teacher for nearly 10 years, “has not been teaching in our district since we learned over the summer that she was the subject of an indicated child-abuse report,” Greg Hayes, a Williamsport Area School District spokesperson, said Tuesday night.

“At that point, she was placed —  and remains —  on suspension with pay,” he added.

“The charges filed against her do not involve any Williamsport Area School District students,” Hayes said.

Following her arraignment, Vassallo was released on $50,000 bail.

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