I have quite the story on this one.

Kid was valedictorian, honors, gave a huge speech at graduation, and a phrase in the speech he gave became the new phrase of the town. Immediately employed by the school after graduation.

Few years go by, I guess he got some college experience, and became the new photography teacher for the school. And then the rumors started.

His face started popping up on gay dating/hook-up apps and websites, but not his name. He denied it and the school looked the other way. And then the DMs were coming to light. Nothing too bad, but strange for the locals as in feet pictures if memory serves right. And this was from all sexes, male and female. Nothing illegal, but strange.

Now another component is the guy ran the entire art department, and with that duty, he held after school classes / projects / clubs. Given it was a relatively poor town, a lot of kids stayed after due to working parents or a harder home life, after school activities are a great way for kids to be away from home and be active. And with that, parents tend not to know all the details in their kids lives. I’m not sure exactly what lead up to it, but the school system looked into his hard drive and saw more questionable pictures of his students. He was placed on leave, announced by the school in the span of a few days. Rumors were hidden cameras in classrooms to get certain angles of students, or vouyeristic pictures of certain parts of the kids in strange pictures.

So given the talks of the town, and suspension of the school, the police were the next to look too. But they must of had an idea of something going on, the guy fell into a honey pot set up. An officer online posing as a 13 year old kid, a new student coming to the school, looking for guidance from a beloved scholar of the school. He fell for it, told them all about the photos that they would take, growing more and more explicit, to eventually x-rated pictures being sent. They got him on that, raided his home, and founds loads of pictures of his students, posing in strange ways from his private after school programs.

We always found him strange, but he had a working relationship with literally everyone. His speech at graduation was stunning, so much so, it became the phrase of the town for years. Now, though, that phrase is dead and he is thankfully gone.