A former Central Florida high school teacher has been sentenced to prison.
The former teacher and soccer coach at Lake Mary High School in Seminole County, Central Florida, was sentenced to over 27 years in prison.
Richard C. Colon, 57, was found guilty of three charges of sexual battery on a child by a person with custodial authority and one count of possession of material depicting sexual conduct by a child.
He was sentenced for carrying on a sexual relationship with a student.
During Richard Colon’s sentencing hearing, Assistant State Attorney Anna Valentini provided evidence that Colon’s contact with the child began in 2022, when he was her teacher. He eventually became her confidante. It progressed to sexually explicit conversations and photographs sent over Snapchat. Within months, the connection escalated to sex acts at Colon’s home and in his classroom during a school break when she had no class and he had no students.
“It wasn’t ‘mutual’ because there was a built-in power dynamic – he was a 56-year-old teacher and coach at her school,” Valentini said. “We trust our children with teachers. This is the ultimate abuse of that trust in the teaching profession.”
From the witness stand, Colon apologized to the girl, her parents, his family, his former Lake Mary High colleagues, and the community as a whole. He stated that he regretted “giving in and not saying no.”
Colon’s defense attorney urged Circuit Judge Michael Rudisill to sentence him to seven years in state prison followed by sex offender probation, which is a break from statutory sentencing guidelines. However, Valentini successfully argued for sticking to criteria that called for 326 months in prison. Sexual battery on a child in Florida carries a maximum sentence of life in prison.
Rudisill noted that Colon’s relationship with the student was more than “a one-time thing. “It started when the girl was an attention-seeking 15-year-old and continued for about two years. “It is fundamental to being a teacher,” Rudisill said. “You do not have sexual contact with the students.”