(Agencies)
Updated: 2007-12-31 09:36

A woman teacher who escaped a jail sentence after having sex with a schoolboy is now facing 15 years behind bars for allegedly breaking the terms of her probation - by talking to a 17-year-old girl.

Former school teacher Debra Lafave walks away from Circuit Judge J. Rogers Padgett with her attorney John Fitzgibbons, right, during a probation violation hearing Tuesday morning Dec. 18, 2007 at the Hillsborough County Courthouse in Tampa, Fla. [Agencies]

Debra Lafave, a former model, became a tabloid cause célèbre in America when it emerged that, in 2004, she had seduced a 14-year-old pupil in a classroom and at her home. She was sentenced to three years under house arrest, seven years on probation, and was banned from teaching. Her husband, who discussed the case on numerous talk shows, divorced her.

The probation conditions specified that she must not have unsupervised contact with minors. She is now accused of violating these terms by having 'intimate conversations' with a 17-year-old female colleague at the restaurant where she worked as a waitress.

Lafave, 27, spoke to the teenager several times about family problems, friends, school, boyfriends and sex, according to a police report.

Her probation officer ordered her arrest and is recommending the harshest possible punishment for the alleged violation - 15 years in prison, the standard sentence for her original crime. She will appear in a court in Florida next week.

The arrest has sparked protests at Danny Boy's Restaurant in Ruskin, Florida, where Lafave was employed - wearing an ankle bracelet with a GPS beacon - from January 2006 until last month, when her probation officer forced her to quit. More than 700 customers have signed a petition expressing support for Lafave and calling for her to be reinstated.

'That's how much the customers miss her,' said Dennis Cutini, owner and manager of Danny Boy's. 'There are people who got to know her and they felt sick in the stomach when they heard about it. I know she enjoyed working here and she needed the job to pay off court fees. It's frustrating.'

He expressed bafflement over the alleged offence involving Lafave's 17-year-old fellow worker. 'They were just normal colleagues. They were never alone together, because there are always three or four of us around cleaning up, so what the probation officer is implying, I don't know. Debbie didn't harass anybody; she didn't coerce anybody.'

Cutini added: 'She had put the past behind her and her lawyer was proud of what she'd done. She'd done two years of house arrest with no flaws, and after two years you can try to get the third year dismissed. Her lawyer was going to make an application for this, so the timing seems very fishy to me.'

Lafave's lawyer, John Fitzgibbons, has entered a formal denial of the allegations and expressed disappointment that she was arrested over an 'insignificant' violation. He said she and the 17-year-old had a 'typical workplace conversation that women have with their women colleagues ... It was a workplace friendship - no more, no less.'

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