Passaic High School teacher asked for lewd pictures in exchange for better grades

The Passaic High School teacher arrested Wednesday on charges he allegedly had sexually inappropriate conversations with two teenage students asked for pictures of their penis in exchange for a better class grade, according to court documents.

When one of the two male students was asked by Jose Maria, who according to court documents is a Spanish teacher, about sending a picture of his private area in exchange for a better grade, the student did. The boy identified only as Ro.C., told authorities Maria would pick him and another teen up to buy them Chinese food and alcohol.

“Ro.C. said he found a picture on the internet of a black penis and sent it to Mr. Maria,” according to a copy of the affidavit of probable cause reviewed Thursday. “Ro.C. said his mother confronted Mr. Maria who admitted it, said he would kill himself and asked her not to go to the police.”

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Maria, 39, was charged Wednesday with endangering the welfare of a child and official misconduct, authorities said. The teens were students at the school when the incident happened between 2010 and 2012. According to court documents, Ro.C. spoke with police Tuesday. 

Maria was immediately suspended from his $75,513 teaching position with pay, said Keith Furlong, a spokesman for the Passaic School District. The suspension is required to be with pay. 

Maria was released on a pretrial monitoring with weekly reporting and the conditions that he would have no contact with the victim and no unsupervised contact with children under 18, a court official said. A cellphone number listed for Maria was disconnected.

Maria has been a teacher since September 2005, Furlong said.

One person who was identified as R.NM, a mother to one of the victims, according to court documents, confronted Maria about the incident.

“R.NM. stated that she confronted Mr. Maria who told her the texts were true and asked for forgiveness,” according to court documents.

Later, student Ro.C. called Maria and asked him about the incident, according to court documents. Maria said he “made a mistake” and deleted the picture, calling it an “impulse” to ask for the picture of the student’s penis.  

Maria admitted in both an audio and video interview with police he asked the two students for pictures of their private areas, according to court documents.

The case has been referred to the grand jury, a court official said.

Email: ortizk@northjersey.com