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Teacher shits her pants, blames students, ends up in jail
Photo of Barron at her Gardena home July 17, 1997. LOS ANGELES TIMES (Photo by Ken Hively/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images)
On July 16, 1997, Dominguez High School English teacher Shannan Michelle Barron, 28, described as "attractive" in this newspaper article, made the following statement to police:
"As I was leaving my class, G-4, 4 male students run up and dumped feces on the front of my clothing splashing my face & hair. I ran back into my room where I was saturated again with feces from the back from my waist down . . . ."
After the alleged incident took place, the vice principal escorted Barron from her classroom to the school gymnasium to shower and confirmed that there were indeed stains on her clothing.
Barron's shocking allegation drew the attention of local and national news outlets, and she was even interviewed by talk-show host Sally Jessy Raphael.
But within a few days, people were beginning to question Barron's story. School police had conducted an investigation but could find no evidence to support her claims. Barron accused school officials of a cover-up, which prompted the president of the school board to publicly announce his support for her, offering a $10,000 reward for information leading to an arrest.
Barron stuck to her story. She told a local newspaper she did not know the students and could only guess their motive. She said she suspected they were friends or relatives of a student she had failed the previous semester. "What these kids did to me was horrible," she told a reporter. "I don't know if I can teach again. I doubt it."
Naturally, police wanted to inspect Barron's soiled garments, as they were valuable evidence. Yet Barron's mother, who had possession of said garments, refused to hand them over to police the day after the incident "because the officers seemed too casual." When the police finally did gain custody of the garments, they made a startling discovery. Forensic tests showed that the bulk of human waste was inside Barron's slacks. In light of the new evidence, police charged Barron with filing a false report, alleging she had wasted over 200 hours of police time. "It appears that Barron had a personal accident and is the source of the feces," Police Chief Hourie L. Taylor told the LA times.
The trial lasted over a month. 24 witnesses were called. Prosecutors argued Barron had soiled herself and invented the story to cover her embarrassment. In the end, the court agreed. The former teacher stood, head lowered, sobbing, as the clerk read out the guilty verdict, her reputation irreparably soiled.
She was sentenced to a four-month suspended jail term, a year of probation, 90 days of electronic monitoring and 12 Saturdays working with a highway transportation crew and was ordered to pay $1,000 restitution. However, Barron skipped her first two scheduled workdays, so she was sentenced to 120 days' imprisonment.
Below is a photo of Barron (left) with her daughter, taken years after these events.
Sadly, Barron's shitty luck didn't end there. In 2008, aged 40, she was murdered by her boyfriend.
My sources are listed below in chronological order:
http://articles.latimes.com/1997/jul/19/local/me-14306
http://articles.latimes.com/1997/jul/18/local/me-13987
http://articles.latimes.com/1997/aug/15/local/me-22621
http://articles.latimes.com/1997/aug/14/local/me-22385
http://articles.latimes.com/1998/jun/23/local/me-62773
http://articles.latimes.com/1998/jul/16/local/me-3993
http://articles.latimes.com/1998/aug/14/local/me-13048
http://articles.latimes.com/1998/sep/29/local/me-27587
http://www.kxxv.com/story/9560948/la...d-by-boyfriend
https://www.legacy.com/obituaries/Pa...&pid=121960158