A teacher accused of having sex with a 17-year-old male student in Nebraska is married to a government official in the Department of Defense.
Forty-five-year-old Erin Ward is facing a single count of felony sexual abuse by a school staffer, the Daily Mail reported Monday.
Officials later released Ward’s mugshot:
DCSO has released Erin Ward’s current booking photo. https://t.co/SZwRupiPUk pic.twitter.com/hQRjD0z8PF
— Omaha Scanner (@omaha_scanner) April 15, 2024
Ward was a substitute teacher at Burke High School in Omaha when she was allegedly found with the student “undressed” in a car parked at a dead-end road around 3:00 a.m., Breitbart News reported Sunday:
Douglas County Sheriff’s deputies were responding to a report of a suspicious car when they happened upon the pair, viewing them rush to put their clothes back on before the teenager got into the driver’s seat and fled the scene before crashing just two blocks away.
The boy got out of the vehicle, which was later determined to belong to Ward and her husband, and ran off on foot. Police found him after over an hour of searching — wearing nothing but boxers, a T-shirt, and socks.
The car being used at the time reportedly belonged to Ward’s husband, identified as William Douglas “Doug” Ward. The Mail report noted he was “appointed Deputy Director of the Commander’s Action Group and Senior Nuclear Deterrence Advisor at the United States Strategic Command in February.”
The Strategic Command’s headquarters is in Omaha, and the outlet noted Doug Ward is a graduate of the Harvard Extension School. The couple lives with their three teenage children in Gretna, near Omaha.
More images show the accused woman with her family:
NEW: The woman who was found naked in a car with her student, is married to Department of Defense commander William Ward.
Erin Ward was charged with felony s*xual abuse for hooking up with a teen in her husband’s car.
Her husband ‘Doug’ Ward is a high ranking government… pic.twitter.com/mOYb7WCddK
— Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) April 16, 2024
Ward worked at multiple local schools and met the teenage boy at Burke. The Mail article said when officers made the discovery, the woman admitted to having sex with the student.
“As the age of consent in Nebraska is 16, Ward was not charged with statutory rape, but faces a Class IIA felony charge carrying up to 20 years in prison,” the outlet said, adding Burke’s principal later announced the teacher would not be returning to any school campuses in the area following the incident.