Former Chicago Public Schools JROTC Instructor Charged With Sexually Assaulting Student
CHICAGO (CBS) -- A former JROTC instructor at Roosevelt High School in Albany Park has been charged with sexually assaulting a girl multiple times since last year, starting when she was 16.
As CBS 2's Tara Molina reported Thursday night, Brian Travis, 46, was arrested around 8:45 a.m. Wednesday at O'Hare International Airport – after he was identified as the man who sexually assaulted the girl several times between 2018 and 2019, when she was 16 to 17 years old.
He was trying to board a flight to Mexico at the time, where Cook County State's Attorney's office said he intended to move and marry the victim.
Police said he also threatened to kill the victim, and her family and friends, when he was fired.
Police investigators have been going through hundreds of Travis' text messages.
He worked at Roosevelt High School, 3436 W. Wilson Ave., until the end of the 2018-2019 school year when he left to work as a manager with the district's JROTC office, according to the Chicago Public Schools.
A CPS representative said told us he was removed from that position on Dec. 3, based on allegations of sexual misconduct.
"Protecting students is our highest priority, and the district removed Brian Travis from his position earlier this month based on allegations of sexual misconduct," the district said in a statement.
But we found Travis, in uniform, on the school and program websites - still listed as a senior instructor.
According to a document from the State's Attorney's office, Travis asked the teen, who would confide in him, "if she wanted to be a sugar baby" in the beginning of the "11-month" relationship.
He eventually joined her gym "despite living in Indiana," where he "reserved a private massage room" to have sex with her, the document claimed.
The inappropriate relationship continued inside his "office at the high school," according to the document.
A witness saw them together "and told him whatever was going on needed to stop," prosecutors said. The teen said Travis was scared and "told her that he would kill that person for $2,000 so they could stay in a relationship together," prosecutors said.
Later, the prosecutors' document said, Travis threatened "to kill (the victim), her parents, and the friends that the Victim was with at the time," because "he blamed the Victim for being fired from his job."
Travis was being held without bond after a judge's orders Thursday. His next court date is set for Thursday, Jan. 2, when the court will review his bail.