Amanda Schweitzer
Amanda Schweitzer
Mugshot of Amanda Schweitzer.
Amanda Schweitzer is a former middle school teacher from Joplin, Missouri. In January, 2018 she was indicted on federal charges related to allegations that she exchanged explicit photos of herself with three students under the age of 15. In August, 2017 she was indicted on state charges relating to allegations that she raped and kidnapped a 13-year-old student. [1]
Career
Amanda Schweitzer is a a former middle school teacher at North Middle School in Joplin, Missouri.
In the Media
Close up photo of Amanda Schweitzer.
In August, 2017 was Amanda Schweitzer first indicted in state with felony charges related to accusations that she raped three students under the age of 15.
On Wednesday, January 24, 2018, Amanda Schweitzer was indicted by a federal grand jury on counts of sexual exploitation of a child and transferring obscene materials to a minor. [1]
Amanda Schweitzer was charged in August, 2017 in Jasper County Circuit Court with statutory rape of a 13-year-old male student and in Newton County Circuit Court with child kidnapping, statutory rape and statutory sodomy involving the same boy.
In Schweitzer's case, both the statutory charges in the state case and the exploitation charge in the federal case carry up to life in prison. [1]
Amanda Schweitzer was charged by the federal grand jury in a sealed indictment on January 24, 2018 in the U.S. District Court in Springfield, Missouri. The indictment was unsealed Thursday with her arrest and initial court appearance. She remains in federal custody pending a detention hearing set for Tuesday, January 31, 2018. Schweitzer had been free on bond in the state court cases since August 3, 2017. [1]
The federal charges pertain to communications Amanda Schweitzer allegedly had with the boy between March 1 and March 29 of last year.
The exploitation charge alleges that she used him to produce child pornography. The second count accuses her of sending him obscene materials "by means of interstate commerce," namely the internet. [1]
A Joplin police investigation of Schweitzer began March 29, 2017 when police were informed of allegations that Amanda Schweitzer sent nude images of herself to three North Middle School boys.
According to one report, the mothers informed the principal that their sons told them about the photos, which had been deleted by the time they learned of them and checked their sons' phones.
The allegations were reported to the state's child abuse hot line March 29 and interviews of the boys were set up at the Children's Center in Joplin. [1]
The mother of two of the boys brought them to the center for interviews March 30 and informed a detective that one of her sons had disclosed to her that he engaged in sexual intercourse with Schweitzer the previous day. She gave the detective a bag containing the boy's shorts and told him that she had not allowed her son to bathe prior to any examination that might be needed. [1]
The boy who made the disclosure told investigators during his interview that Schweitzer began sending text messages to him several weeks earlier.
"She told him that he was hot and that she wanted him," the detective wrote in the report.
He primarily communicated with her using Instagram, the boy told investigators.
She had sent him photographs of her breasts and other nude photos of herself in the past, including one involving a sex toy, according to the report.
She also asked him to send her photos of himself, he told investigators.
The week preceding the week of the interview, it was spring break and Schweitzer had taken him "to the river" in her car, and they had sex for the first time, the boy told investigators.
She was drunk and offered him some of her drink, but he refused, the boy told investigators.
She then touched him and performed a sex act on him followed by intercourse, the boy told investigators. Afterward, he asked her to take him home and she dropped him off a couple of blocks from his house. [1]
The boy told investigators that he believes that they were somewhere near Diamond, Missouri that first time. He recalled there being "a bar under caves," a detail of the police report that lines up with the probable-cause affidavit in the Newton County case, which names a campground south of Joplin. [1]
A supplemental report in the police investigation indicates that a possible corroborating witness came forward in April to state that he recognized Schweitzer in images on local news coverage as a woman he encountered in the campground, although he could not recall the exact date.
He said he came upon Schweitzer in the company of a boy he took to be her son.
He thought she looked familiar then and told her that.
She told him that her family often used the campground and that she worked at North Middle School in Joplin.
The witness told police that he could smell alcohol in the cup the woman had in her hand and thought it odd that she would be drinking in the presence of her son.
The boy told investigators that the second time they had sex had been the day before the interview, on March 29.
He had not gone to school and was at a relative's home when she text messaged him asking why he was not at school.
She then came by, picked him up and took him to her house, where they again had intercourse.
The boy told investigators that there was a blue-and-white blanket with a floral pattern on the bed.
When police served a search warrant on Schweitzer's residence the day of the boy's interview, a blue-and-white comforter was found in the dryer, according to another supplemental police report.
Theresa Kenney, the Jasper County prosecutor, indicated Friday that the federal indictment of Amanda Schweitzer most likely will postpone prosecution of the state cases.
Schweitzer currently has a trial date set in April on the Jasper County charge.
"Typically, what we do is wait and see what happens (in federal court)," Kenney said of cases federal prosecutors assert jurisdiction.
Sometimes, federal cases may be easier to prosecute or carry potentially longer sentences if a conviction is obtained, Kenney said.