A former Auburn Adventist Academy Bible teacher accused of having sex with a teenage female student pleaded not guilty Wednesday to a count of third-degree rape of a child and two counts of first-degree sexual misconduct with a minor.
Scott Spies, 49, who had taught at the school since 2008, appeared with his attorney, Jeff Cohen, before Superior Judge Mary Roberts at the Norm Maleng Regional Justice Center in Kent.
Spies and his attorney declined comment afterward. He is free on $150,000 bail. His next court appearance is April 1.
Deputy prosecutor David Gross asked that Spies have no contact at all with any minors, but Roberts directed that he have no contact with minors unless the meeting occurs in the presence of an adult who is aware of the charges. A no-contact order with his former student remains in place.
If convicted on all three counts, Spies could spend up to five years in prison, according to the King County
School officials said they fired Spies immediately after he allegedly admitted to having sex with the student. Auburn Police arrested him at his apartment and booked him into the Regional Justice Center in Kent.
School officials said they are helping the girl and providing counselors for other students.
According to an Auburn Police detective’s statement filed with charging papers, the dean of women students, Linda Sanborn, first learned about the relationship from other students. When she brought the girl into her office to question her, she denied having sex with Spies. Sanborn later brought Spies into her office and he, too, denied having sex with the girl.
Sanborn determined from statements provided by other students that the sexual encounters had happened at Spies’ Auburn apartment. Sanborn then brought the girl back into her office where she allegedly admitted to having sex with Spies beginning when she was 15 years old.
Sanborn again questioned Spies, at which time, according to the statement, he admitted to the sexual encounters. He was immediately fired, barred from campus and forbidden from any further involvement with students.
According to the detective’s statement, Spies was arrested after admitting to police at his apartment that he had sex with the student.
According to the detective’s statement, the girl later told Auburn police that she first met Spies in February of 2009. She told police that he became her mentor, helped her with her problems and spent time talking with her. According to the statement, she told police that by the end of the school year, she and Spies knew that they liked each other.
According to the statement, the girl went home to Thailand during summer break but said that she and Spies communicated all summer long via e-mail. She said they first had sex in August at his home just before school started. She told police they had sex at his apartment but also twice in his school office.
According to the statement, she told police they both acknowledged to each other that what they were doing was wrong but continued anyway. She estimated that they had 15 sexual encounters, and that the last had occurred on Valentine’s Day.
Spies, who graduated from the Auburn Adventist Academy in 1979, has a masters of arts in teaching. Before teaching at the Academy, he taught eighth grade at nearby Buena Vista Elementary School from the fall of 2000 to the spring of 2008. Buena Vista is also a Seventh Day Adventist school.
