MIDDLE TOWNSHIP, N.J. (Court TV) — A former fifth-grade teacher pleaded guilty in New Jersey after giving birth to a child prosecutors said was fathered by a then-13-year-old student.
Laura Caron appears in court during a detention hearing on Jan. 21, 2025. (Court TV)
Laura Caron, 36, pleaded guilty to second-degree endangering the welfare of a child with sexual conduct as part of an agreement with prosecutors that requires her to surrender her teaching license and forfeit all future public employment.
Caron was initially charged with aggravated sexual assault, sexual assault and endangering the welfare of a child after prosecutors said she engaged in a yearslong relationship with a student beginning when he was 11 years old and in her fifth-grade classroom. The sexual contact with the student, prosecutors said at a detention hearing in 2025, began in 2016 and continued for four years, resulting in the birth of a child in 2019 allegedly fathered by the then-13-year-old victim.
Prosecutors said that Caron was friends with the victim’s family and arranged for the child to stay at her house, which progressed to the victim living with her full-time before police intervened in the case.
A Facebook post brought the situation to light. The victim’s father posted on social media in 2024, saying that Caron’s 5-year-old child looked like his son. The superintendent saw the post, flagged it and began an investigation. When detectives interviewed the victim, he confirmed that he was in a sexual relationship with Caron and that he was the father of her child.
At the 2025 detention hearing, prosecutors said they had calculated the number of sexual assaults based on interviews with the victim and estimated that he had been abused a total of 416 times.
In a press release announcing Caron’s guilty plea, prosecutors said that Caron had agreed to a five-year sentence in state prison. Before she begins serving her sentence, however, she will be evaluated to determine whether she is “repetitive and/or compulsive,” which could affect her sentence. After she completes her prison sentence, Caron will be required to register on the Megan’s Law Offender Registry and remain on parole supervision for the rest of her life.
Caron’s sentencing is scheduled for Jan. 8, 2027.
