ST. LOUIS COUNTY, Mo. — A former nurse at St. John Vianney High School pleaded guilty in court on Monday to sexually assaulting a student.
In May, St. Louis County prosecutors charged 42-year-old Erin Foerstel of Kirkwood with second-degree statutory sodomy and sexual contact with a student younger than 17 earlier this year, and court documents say she made a full confession.
As part of her plea deal, which is called a Suspended Imposition of Sentence, Foerstel must register as a sex offender and serve five years of probation. If she violates her probation, she must go before the judge, who will decide her prison sentence.
If she completes the probation successfully, there will be no criminal conviction on her record.
St. Louis County Prosecutor Wesley Bell said he believes the punishment fits the crime because the victim's family was heavily involved in the decision.
"This is about accountability," Bell said. "You have to keep in mind that a trial means that the victim has to relive these facts all over again.
"The family has to relive these facts all over again in a public setting, and and there's times in cases where the family wants to be able to get closure and move on and not have their situation put out for public scrutiny any more than it has been already."
Foerstel's attorney said she can no longer work as a nurse in a school, but his client can appeal decisions about the status of her nursing license to the Board of Nursing.
She will also be forced to move because she lives so close to the school, located on South Kirkwood Road. Because of Foerstel's sex offender status, she will not be able to participate in any of her own children's school-related events.
Foerstel attended Monday's hearing alone and wiped away tears at certain points. The judge asked her to repeat her one-word answers several times because she was difficult to hear.
The victim's family gave an impact statement in court Monday saying this sentence brought them "closure but not peace."
A family member asked how Foerstel could harm another mother's child like this when she is a mother to young boys of her own.
They said Foerstel had been grooming their son for months, sending him text messages, Facebook and Snapchat messages and telling him what to tell his parents so he could hide where he really was from them.
"We have been wondering, 'What did we miss?'" the victim's family member told the judge.
The victim's family brought up an example of how some of the social media started between Foerstel and the victim, saying one of the messages she sent the victim included asking for his opinion on a pair of shoes she bought.
"This was not a random person, she preyed on a young man working on what it means to become a man...We do not believe our son is the only one, but he was the only one who had the courage to speak up about a sexual predator and a sex offender," the victim's family member told the court.
On the night the sex crime happened in April, the victim's family member said Foerstel told the victim to tell his parents he was at Vianney.
"We thought, 'Oh, he's at Vianney, he's safe, what could go wrong?'" the family member told the judge. "We are now left to pick up the pieces.
"Our son is full of anger and embarrassment."
The victim's family member also told the court that Foerstel not only failed their son, their family, her own husband and children, but also failed her profession as a nurse sworn to abstain from anything that is harmful.
Following Foerstel's arrest, and despite objections from prosecutors, Judge John Lasater reduced her bond from $75,000 cash only to 10% of $50,000 after Foerstel’s lawyer, Gabe Crocker, argued the sexual act was consensual and didn’t involve threats, force or compulsion. Children younger than 17 cannot give consent according to Missouri law.
Foerstel was placed on house arrest with GPS monitoring after paying her bond and was banned from going on the Vianney campus or communicating with the victim.
Crocker issued a statement to 5 On Your Side Monday, which read: "This has been a difficult situation for all parties involved. The healing process for everyone may now begin."
The Missouri Department of Social Services encourages anyone who suspects child abuse or neglect to call its toll-free hotline at 1-800-392-3738. The Missouri Child Abuse and Neglect Hotline is answered 24 hours a day, every day, all year round.
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