Former teacher may face extra year in prison

A former middle school teacher charged with having sexual relations with a 17-year-old boy may face an additional year in prison after being arrested again last week.

Gay Davidson-Shepard, who retired this spring from Mesa View Middle School, was arrested Dec. 7 by Westminster police after investigators determined that she had violated a restraining order by calling and texting the alleged victim, according to Deputy District Attorney Angela Hong.

Davidson-Shepard and her husband, former Westminster High School teacher Daniel Shepard, were arrested in April on suspicion of having sexual relations with a male Westminster High student. They are charged with multiple felony counts, including oral copulation of a minor, sodomy of a person younger than 18 and contributing to the delinquency of a minor.

After Davidson-Shepard’s arrest last week, she faces an additional misdemeanor charge of violating a protective order, Hong said. If convicted on this charge, she faces a maximum of one year in jail in addition to the maximum eight years and four months she would serve if convicted of the felony charges, according to district attorney spokeswoman Farrah Emami.

At the time of her arrest, Davidson-Shepard was out on $150,000 bail and is now being held on an additional $100,000 bail for the new charge. She and her husband are scheduled for a pretrial hearing at 8:30 a.m. Jan. 5 at the West Justice Center in Westminster to consolidate the misdemeanor and pending felony case.

The former teachers pleaded not guilty to the felony charges in June.

michael.miller@latimes.com

Twitter: @MichaelMillerHB