A former Acadiana educator has pleaded guilty to a child porn charge.
Jacob De La Paz already was convicted at trial of one count attempted receipt of child pornography this summer; last week he entered a guilty plea to a charge of attempted possession of child pornography, records show.
Prosecutors had accused the former educator of the attempted receipt charge and of attempted production of child pornography. After a trial, the jury convicted him on the first charge, but couldn't reach a verdict on the second. Prosecutors said at that time that they would retry him on the second charge and a a trial date was set.
Last week, on the same day that the plea agreement was filed, the government filed a Bill of Information with the attempted possession charge - to which De La Paz pleaded guilty.
De La Paz faces a mandatory minimum sentence of five years in prison on the receipt charge; he already faced up to 10 years in prison on the possession charge. De La Paz has been in prison since he was indicted in May 2023.
As part of his guilty plea De La Paz admitted that, in January 2023 when he was a teacher at St. Thomas More Catholic High School in Lafayette, he began communication with a prior student at North Vermilion High School, where he used to teach. They were using Facebook messenger. This former student, who was a minor, needed help with math. De La Paz admitted that he asked the girl to send him a sexually explicit image of herself to him.
During his trial, De La Paz put the blame on the girl for the exchange, saying that she told him to ask her for a sexually explicit video.
De La Paz was a coach at STM when the videos came to light last spring; he was fired from STM back in April 2023 after the video of him asking the girl for a sexually explicit video began circulated online.
As KATC Investigates reported, De La Paz had previouslybeen disciplined in Arkansas for inappropriate text messages to a student. Despite that, he was hired in Vermilion Parish, and later by St. Thomas More High School. To read more about the case, click here and here.
To read our story about his conviction, click here. To read our story about the trial testimony, click here.
Here's some more background:
Just months after De La Paz was indicted in 2023, another STM coach was arrested, and indicted, on similar charges. He pleaded guilty and has been sentenced.
Angel Cardona, 35, pleaded guilty to one count of the indictment against him; in exchange, the government agreed to dismiss the other two charges after he is sentenced. He faces a mandatory minimum sentence of 10 years in prison. Hewas sentencedto 10 years in prison.
The indictment accused Cardona of attempting to create child pornography on July 11 and July 13 of last year, and of using a facility between June 6 and June 24 to entice a child to engage in criminal sexual activity.
In court, he admitted to the enticement charge, admitting that he reached out to a person he thought was a 13-year-old girl in early June 2023. The person, to whom he was speaking online, said they were going to summer school and Cardona said he "thought I could help them." He continued talking to the person - who actually was an FBI agent - for about five weeks.
Then he asked for pictures of her, and agreed to meet her in person; they made a date to meet at Veteran's Park in Lafayette on July 24. Cardona told the judge that he asked for sexually explicit photos of the child. He used the Whisper and Kik apps, records show.
To read about his guilty plea, click here.
