US Teacher Gets 10 Years For Sexually Assaulting Juvenile Inmate, Plotting Husband’s Killing

Last Updated:November 16, 2025, 20:15 IST

Elena Bardin, a teacher at Adair County Juvenile Detention Center, was sentenced to 14 years for sexual abuse of a 17-year-old inmate and sending explicit letters and photos.

Prosecutors said the teacher groomed a juvenile inmate, assaulted him, and later urged him to murder her husband. (IMAGE: YouTube/CourtTV)

A married teacher was sentenced to 14 years in prison this week after a jury convicted her of first-degree sexual abuse and unlawful transaction with a minor for having explicit sexual contact with a minor at the Adair County Juvenile Detention Centre.

Adair County is around 140kms from Louisville, one of the major cities of the US state of Kentucky.

27-year-old Elena Bardin taught English in the detention centre where she encountered the 17-year-old boy and after sexually abusing him asked him to kill her husband.

Bardin, who also has a five-year-old daughter, was acquitted of that charge.

Authorities arrested her in April when they found about 193 sexually explicit letters and photos she had allegedly sent to the boy while conducting a routine search of the teen’s room at the lock-up.

The judge highlighted that Bardin admitted to having sexual contact with the inmate in one of her letters.

“The letters you sent, which they were juicy, they were things you’d see in a triple-x movie, and completely inappropriate, obviously, and I think you know that for a young man that age," Circuit Judge Samuel Spalding said at Thursday’s sentencing, according to a report by the New York Post.

“And for an educator, it was incumbent upon you to set a better example. I will say though, the 193 pages of letters, pictures, everything else, it depicts a very intelligent and articulate young woman who was clearly articulating her thoughts and desires to this kid."

News world US Teacher Gets 10 Years For Sexually Assaulting Juvenile Inmate, Plotting Husband’s Killing

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