Former Palmetto High teacher Jason Meyers sentenced to prison after student rape conviction
MIAMI -- A popular former teacher at Palmetto Senior High School teacher who was convicted in January of having sex with an underage student was ordered to prison Monday.
Miami-Dade Circuit Judge Cristina Miranda ordered Jason Meyers to serve 20 years in prison after being convicted on three counts of statutory rape. Jurors determined he used his position of authority to have sex with a student when she was 17. Meyers could have been sentenced to life in prison after being found guilty by the jury.
The judge, who also rejected a defense motion for a new trial, ruled that Meyers, 47, would serve 20 years for each of the three counts he was found guilty of but she said the sentences would run concurrently.
The judge also ordered Meyers, who has five young children, to serve 10 years of probation after his release from state prison.
"There is no sentencing I get pleasure in," she said while addressing a defense request that she consider Meyers' young children and the impact the prison sentence will have on them. "There is always a family impacted by the decision either way. You have the victims' families. You have the defendants' families. I wish with all my heart he had not made these decisions."
During the trial, prosecutors portrayed Meyers as a predator who used sexual themes in his creative writing class to entice a naive, then 17-year-old student into having sex with him at least three times.
Meyers was arrested in February 2016 on the charges. He was married at the time and his wife, who worked at the school, was pregnant.
The Miami-Dade school system fired Meyers after his arrest.