A teacher with four children raped one of her pupils before getting pregnant and marrying him. Mary Kay Letourneau first met Vili Fualaau when he was in second grade, aged seven or eight, before sexually abusing him.
She then became his teacher when he reached sixth grade at secondary school in Seattle. The teacher began giving the boy special attention, including encouraging her own son to become friends with him. Mary Kay then started having sex with him after falling head over heels in love when she was 34 and he was 12.
As reported by the Daily Record, it was only when her husband, Steve, found a love letter between the pair that a relative of his went to the police. Mary Kay was then arrested and pleaded guilty to two counts of second degree child rape.
However, she was already pregnant with their first child, Audrey. After being sent to jail, Mary Kay continued the relationship with the boy and served just three months behind bars.
After being released, she was caught once again with the child and sent to prison for seven years. By that time she was pregnant with their second child and the pair eventually got married.
Mary Kay’s family and friends were shocked by the scandal. She came from a wealthy and religious family but her dad, a former college lecturer and Californian state senator, was dying from cancer at the time of the illegal affair.
Mary Kay served just three months in prison in return for plea deals, including not to contact Vili ever again. However, she was caught having sex with him in a car just 30 days after being released.
According to CBS News, the car contained clothes, $6,200 in cash and her passport hidden under the floor mat. She was then jailed for seven and a half years, and gave birth to their second daughter, Georgia, while behind bars.
This made Vili a father of two by the age of just 15. The pair wrote a book together called Only One Crime: Love while she was in jail for the second time.
When asked if she feared going to jail for the illegal affair, Mary Kay said: “Oh, no. There wasn’t a time that I thought or he thought that, ‘Oh, you could go to prison for that’.
“I thought, ‘Gee you know this doesn’t look good.’ You know? Just being a teacher.”
She added that it was her husband who said she could go to prison. He eventually moved to Alaska with their four children following the scandal.
She explained: “It was actually my ex-husband had said, ‘Ha. My divorce attorney says that you can be charged with a felony’. And I was like, ‘felony?’ I was really thinking there would be a fine, like pay a fine option.”
Mary Kay was released from prison in 2004 before marrying Vili a year later. The couple stayed together and raised their two daughters before splitting in 2019.
It then emerged that the couple had been struggling for a while. Vili reportedly turned to alcohol following a decline in his mental health.
His friend revealed: “He sees things clearly now and realises that this wasn’t a healthy relationship from the start.” The pair remained on good terms before Mary Died from cancer at the age of 58 in 2020.
A statement from Vili and her previous family read: “Mary fought tirelessly against this terrible disease. Mary, and all of us, found great strength in having our immediate and extended family members together to join her in this arduous struggle.
“We did our very best to care for Mary and one another as we kept her close and stayed close together.”
A friend of his added: “He lost a piece of himself. He understands how f***** up everything was in how they got together. He’s not stupid.
“But he can’t turn off his feelings completely, and it’s a big loss for him. He talked to her right before she passed, and they said everything they needed to say.”
