Too hot for jail ex-teacher Debra Lafave won her Florida appeal to terminate probation early, nearly a decade after pleading guilty to having sex with a 14-year-old male student.
The state Supreme Court overturned an appellate court ruling that reinstated Lafave’s sex offender probation, claiming in Thursday’s 19-page decision that the court had no jurisdiction, The Tampa Bay Times reported.
Lafave, 34, is “very thankful that the case has finally, finally, finally come to an end,” attorney John Fitzgibbons told The Tampa Tribune.
Lafave, then 23, was a newlywed and reading teacher at Greco Middle School in Tampa when she was busted for having sex with a boy in her classroom and in her car on four different occasions in 2004.
Fitzgibbons famously said Lafave, a blond beauty, shouldn’t go to prison because, “to place Debbie into a Florida state women’s penitentiary, to place an attractive young woman in that kind of hellhole, is like putting a piece of raw meat in with the lions.”
She faced up to 30 years behind bars, but because her victim wanted to avoid a trial, Lafave pleaded guilty to two counts of lewd and lascivious battery and got off with a combination of house arrest and probation.
Lafave was released from house arrest in 2008 and a plea to have her probation cut short in 2011 was granted, but the 2nd District Court of Appeals reversed the decision in 2012. Now the state Supreme Court has struck down the reversal.
The Hillsborough State Attorney’s Office said it was “disappointed in the ruling. We felt that our argument was valid in that a deal is a deal, but we respect the decision of the court and we’ll move forward,” spokesman Mark Cox told The Tribune.
Lafave is still a registered sex offender, with restrictions on where she can live and work, according to The Times.
jmolinet@nydailynews.com Follow on Twitter @jmolinet
