A 30-year-old former Perris High School math teacher and coach who sexually assaulted a boy on multiple occasions was sentenced Friday to five years, eight months in state prison.
Gerardo Curiel Regalado of Perris in October admitted five counts of sodomy of a child under 16 years old, as well as one count each of supplying pornography to a minor and annoying a child.
The plea was made directly to Riverside County Superior Court Judge Ronald Taylor, without input from the District Attorney’s Office.
Prosecutors objected to the plea agreement when it was announced, but Taylor overruled the challenge.
According to sheriff’s Sgt. John Burke, deputies were notified near the end of January 2021 of inappropriate contact between Regalado and the victim, identified in court documents only as “John Doe,” beginning in 2013.
Burke said that, at the time, Regalado was working as a tutor and varsity volleyball coach for both the boys’ and girls’ teams at Perris High.
According to court records, the illicit sex acts occurred mostly in 2015, both in Perris and Lake Elsinore. The circumstances were not disclosed.
Prosecutors said there was a second youth on whom the defendant additionally focused his attention, but no sexual abuse was alleged, only harassment. That victim’s name also was not revealed.
Soon after the sheriff’s investigation began, Regalado was suspended from his position as a math teacher, a job into which he had started in August 2019 after being a tutor, according to the Perris Union High School District.
Officials said that shortly before he was taken into custody, Regalado resigned his post.
Regalado had no documented prior felony convictions in Riverside County.