About Mary Kay Letourneau
Mary Katherine Fualaau (previously Letourneau, née Schmitz; January 30, 1962 – July 6, 2020) was an American teacher who pleaded guilty in 1997 to two counts of felony second-degree rape of a child and subsequently married her victim/former student. The case received national attention. After achieving a teaching degree in 1989, Mary Letourneau started working at an elementary school in Burien, Washington. In September 1991, she first met Vili Fualaau, a second-grade pupil. Letourneau admired Fualaau's artistic abilities and kept in touch while not being his teacher. Letourneau and Fualaau met again in the fall of 1995, in sixth-grade class. In June 1996, Letourneau, aged 34, committed statutory rape against Fualaau, aged 12. In September, she found out she was pregnant with Fualaau's child. Letourneau was arrested in March 1997, after a relative of her husband contacted the police. While awaiting sentencing, she gave birth to Fualaau's daughter. With the state seeking a seven-and-a-half-year prison sentence, she reached a plea bargain calling for six months in jail with three months suspended and no contact with Fualaau for life, among other terms. Shortly after Letourneau had completed three months in jail, the police caught her in a car with Fualaau. A judge revoked her plea agreement and reinstated the prison sentence for the maximum allowed by law of seven-and-a-half years. Eight months after returning to prison, she gave birth to Fualaau's second child, another daughter. Letourneau was imprisoned from 1998 to 2004, spending half a year in solitary confinement for her communication attempts with Fualaau. After her release, she and Fualaau successfully petitioned to the court to have their no-contact order lifted. Mary Letourneau and Vili Fualaau were married in May 2005. The marriage lasted 14 years; they legally separated in 2019. Letourneau died in 2020, aged 58, from colon cancer, leaving much of her estate to Fualaau. Determined to get a career in education, Mary Kay enrolled in Seattle University and was awarded a teaching degree in 1989. In 2010, the Letourneaus became grandparents when their eldest son had a daughter.
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